Missouri Department of Health and Senior Services (MSHSS) informs that a resident has been infected with Naegleria fowleri. Naegleria fowleri is a microscopic single-celled free-living ameba that can cause a rare life-threatening infection of the brain called primary amebic meningoencephalitis (PAM). The patient is in an ICU. The ameba is commonly found in warm freshwater such as lakes, rivers, and ponds; however, PAM is extremely rare. Since 1962, only 154 known cases have been identified in the US. The only other case identified among a Missouri resident occurred in 1987, and currently, no additional suspected cases of PAM are being investigated in Missouri. The source of the patient's exposure is being investigated by public health officials. Local and out-of-state activity are being considered. Recreational water users should assume that Naegleria fowleri is present in warm freshwater across the US; however, infection remains rare.
Although a rare occurrence, people become infected by Naegleria fowleri when water containing the ameba enters the body through the nose from freshwater sources. The Naegleria fowleri ameba then travels up the nose to the brain where it destroys the brain tissue. This infection cannot be spread from one person to another, and it cannot be contracted by swallowing contaminated water. A 12-year-old boy in South Carolina died of PAM earlier this summer: SC Boy Dies of PAM.
On a separate water safety issue, earlier this year the Florida Department of Health ("D'Oh!) reported 17 cases (five deaths) of flesh-eating bacteria infections (which enters the body through open cuts or wounds, unlike the brain-eating ameba which enters through the mouth or nostrils): www.floridahealth.gov
Related gross topic?
Worm invades man's eyeball, leading doctors to suck out his eye jelly
arstechnica.com
... For eight months, a 35-year-old man in India was bothered by his left eye. It was red and blurry. When he finally visited an ophthalmology clinic, it didn't take long for doctors to unearth the cause.
In a case report in the New England Journal of Medicine, doctors report that they first noted that the eye was bloodshot and inflamed, and the pupil was dilated and fixed. The man's vision in the eye was 20/80. A quick look inside his eye revealed it was all due to a small worm, which they watched "moving sluggishly" in the back of his eyeball.
To gouge out the parasitic pillager, the doctors performed a pars plana vitrectomy"a procedure that involves sucking out some of the jelly-like vitreous inside the eye. This procedure can be used in the treatment of a variety of eye conditions, but using it to hoover up worms is rare. In order to get in, the doctors make tiny incisions in the white parts of the eye (the sclera) and use a hollow needle-like device with suction. They replace extracted eye jelly with things like saline.
In this case, the device was able to suck in part of the worm's tail and drag it out"still squirming. Under the microscope, they quickly identified the peeper creeper. With a bulbous head, well-formed intestines, and a thick outer layer, it perfectly fit the description of Gnathostoma spinigerum, a known bodily marauder that can sometimes wiggle its way into eyeballs. ...
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