墨西哥恰帕斯州南部城镇梅塔帕-德-多明格斯，10月15日 — — 一股腐臭味笼罩着墨西哥南部恰帕斯州的一个城镇，周四促使居民走上街头，要求拆除位于美墨抗击食肉性新世界螺旋虫寄生虫斗争中心的无菌蝇工厂。
METAPA DE DOMINGUEZ, Mexico, Oct 15 - A rotten smell hanging over a town in Mexico's southern Chiapas state drove residents into the streets on Thursday to demand the removal of a sterile-fly plant at the center of the US-Mexican fight against the flesh-eating New World screwworm parasite.
梅塔帕-德-多明格斯的居民将这种气味比作腐烂的肉和变质的食物，形容其为“刺鼻刺口”，并引起恶心。抗议者表示，这种气味曾集中在工厂周围，如今可在更远处被察觉，尤其是当风将其吹遍城镇时。气味已蔓延至工厂附近的学校，扰乱了课堂秩序。
Residents in Metapa de Dominguez compared the odor to rotting meat and spoiled food, describing it as “pungent in your nose and mouth” and causing nausea. The smell, once concentrated around the plant, could now be detected farther away, particularly when winds carried it across the town, protesters said. The odor had reached schools near the plant and disrupted classes.
卡车司机梅赛德斯·贝塞拉·德拉·克鲁斯说：“我们不在乎他们投入了多少。我们只想让这家工厂离开这里，因为飘过城镇的气味太难以忍受了。”
"We don't care about the investment they made. What we want is for this plant to leave here, because the smell coming over the town is too much," said truck driver Mercedes Becerra de la Cruz.
这些抱怨发生在墨西哥总统克劳迪娅·谢因鲍姆和美国农业部长布鲁克·罗林斯于6月27日为该设施揭幕不到四个月后。美国农业部向这座耗资5100万美元的设施投资了2100万美元，这是更广泛努力的一部分，旨在遏制曾扰乱跨境牛贸易的螺旋虫爆发。
The complaints come less than four months after Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum and US Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins inaugurated the facility on June 27. The US Department of Agriculture invested $21 million toward the $51 million facility, part of a broader effort to halt a screwworm outbreak that disrupted the cross-border cattle trade.
无菌蝇是抗击螺旋虫的主要手段，这种寄生虫的幼虫会钻入牛和其他温血动物的活体组织中，若不及时治疗可能导致死亡。
Sterile flies are the main defense against screwworm, a parasite whose larvae burrow into the living flesh of cattle and other warm-blooded animals and can kill them if untreated.
这种害虫在美国数十年前已被根除，但如今从中美洲经墨西哥向北蔓延，促使华盛顿对墨西哥牛肉进口实施了超过一年的禁令。梅塔帕工厂预计最终将每周生产1亿只无菌蝇。
Eradicated from the US decades ago, the pest has surged north from Central America through Mexico, prompting Washington to impose a more than year-long ban on Mexican cattle imports. The Metapa plant is expected eventually to produce 100 million sterile flies a week.
墨西哥目前爆发中已记录近48000例螺旋虫病例，美国则记录了53例。
Mexico has recorded nearly 48,000 cases of screwworm in the current outbreak and the United States 53.
梅塔帕工厂内，每周都要繁殖数百万只苍蝇，其幼虫被喂食一种精心配制的混合物，其中包含鸡蛋、牛奶和粉末状血红蛋白，模拟伤口富含营养的环境。这些苍蝇在释放前会被绝育，以数百万计地释放，与野生雌性交配但不产生后代，从而逐渐抑制种群数量。
Inside the Metapa plant, millions of flies are bred each week, their larvae fed a carefully formulated mixture of egg, milk and powdered hemoglobin that mimics the nutrient-rich conditions of a wound. The flies are sterilized before being released by the millions to mate with wild females without producing offspring, gradually suppressing the population.
工厂围墙之外，居民表示，日常生活越来越受到一种令人难以忍受的气味的影响，这种气味飘散到周围的社区和学校。
Outside its walls, residents said daily life has increasingly been shaped by an overpowering odor that drifts into surrounding neighborhoods and schools.
“我们需要联邦政府做出回应，并将工厂迁走。它离得太近了，就在镇子中央，”49岁的家庭主妇罗萨尔巴·梅里达·埃雷拉说。“为了我们的孩子和老人，我们请求他们关注这一情况，因为这个问题现在正在影响整个城镇。”墨西哥农业部的一位发言人没有立即回应置评请求。
"We need the federal government to respond and have the plant relocated. It is far too close, right in the middle of the town," said 49-year-old homemaker Rosalba Merida Herrera. "For the sake of our children and our elderly, we are asking them to look at the situation, as this issue is now affecting the entire town." A spokesperson for Mexico's Agriculture Ministry did not immediately respond to a request for comment.