A parasitic disease that can lurk silently in the human heart for decades before triggering fatal cardiac arrest has been officially recognized as endemic in the United States. The CDC's Emerging Infectious Diseases journal published a landmark study in September 2025 — co-authored by researchers from Texas A&M University, the University of Florida, and the Texas Department of State Health Services — concluding that Chagas disease is an endemic disease of the United States, not merely an imported infection from Latin America. The study called for recognition of that endemicity to drive improvements in surveillance, research, and public health responses.
The CDC updated its Chagas disease pages most recently on February 4, 2026, reflecting fresh institutional attention to a disease that has long been undercounted and under-resourced. The update arrives as summer weather activates kissing bugs — the nocturnal blood-feeding insects that spread the Trypanosoma cruzi parasite — across the southern and southwestern United States, where 11 triatomine species have been found in 32 states.
