What We Do—and Don’t—Know About Brain-Eating Amoebas
A 12-year-old Arkansas girl has been in a hospital for over a week after being infected with a typically fatal parasite that enters through the nose and consumes brain tissue.
This rare form of parasitic meningitis—primary amebic meningoencephalitis (PAM)—is caused by an amoeba called Naegleria fowleri. That microscopic amoeba—part of the class of life called protozoans—is a naturally occurring organism that normally feeds on bacteria and tends to live in the sedimentary layer of warm lakes and ponds.
Under certain conditions, Naegleria fowleri can develop flagella—threadlike structures that enable it to rapidly move around and look for more favorable conditions. When people swim in warm freshwater during the summer, water contaminated with the moving amoeba can be forced up the nose and into the brain.
This causes headache, stiff neck, and vomiting, which progresses to more serious symptoms. Between exposure and onset, infection generally results in a coma and death after around five days.
Where is it found?
We see it in warm freshwater or in places with minimal chlorination. It is not uncommon to detect the amoeba if you sample freshwater in warm weather states.
Know more : http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2013/13/130731-deadly-brain-eating-amoebas-parasites-meningitis-naegleria-fowleri-epidemiology/
Welcome :)
ReplyDeleteProbably the girl is somehow immunologically compromised?
ReplyDeleteStudies show that many people may have antibodies to N. fowleri. That suggests that they became infected with the amoeba but that their immune systems fought it off.
ReplyDeleteSo, it's not at all clear whether N. fowleri is a rare infection that always causes PAM and is almost always fatal, or a more common infection that only sometimes causes PAM...so u might be right on that one Heikki Arponen .
N. fowleri amoebas are attracted to the chemicals that nerve cells use to communicate with one another. Once in the nose, the amoebas travel through the olfactory nerve into the frontal lobe of the brain.... so perhaps there we need to look and search for answers.
The advise being: do not splash, jump, dive, or otherwise force water up the nose in lakes and pools, especially when water is warm.
ReplyDeleteThank you. It is an immensely useful one. I will be careful in future.
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