A 10-year-old girl died after contracting a rare brain-eating amoeba called Naegleria fowleri while swimming in the Brazos River and Lake Whitney in Texas over Labor Day weekend.
Lily Mae Avant, a fifth-grader, became ill with a fever and headache the weekend after swimming in a pool, and her health quickly deteriorated, according to CNN affiliate KWTX news in Bosque County, Texas.
Naegleria fowleri is a single-celled living organism commonly found in soil and warm freshwater such as lakes, hot springs, rivers, typically in Southern states, and in poorly maintained swimming pools.
Although rare, most Naegleria fowleri infections occur when people swim in contaminated water and inhale or splash the water into their nose.
Symptoms usually begin within two weeks of exposure and include headache, fever, nausea, vomiting and stiff neck. As the disease progresses, confusion, loss of balance, seizures and hallucinations may occur, with death typically occurring within one to 12 days.
Other deaths from the brain-eating amoeba have been blamed on neti pots. Such deaths occurred when people used contaminated tap water in a neti pot to flush out their nasal passages and irrigate their sinuses. This gave the amoeba easy access to their brains, where it caused an infection that is lethal in 95% of cases.
Because tap water can be home to any number of contaminants, it’s extremely important to use only sterile, distilled or boiled water — that is allowed to cool — for nasal irrigation with a neti pot.
There are several types of organisms that can be dangerous to humans, not only in freshwater but in coastal (salt) waters, as well. One is Vibrio vulnificus, the cause of necrotizing fasciitis — commonly known as flesh eating disease.
The risk of infection in both brain-eating amoeba and flesh eating disease rises along with water temperatures, since warm water spurs growth and the bacteria adheres well to skin.
The flesh eating virus has claimed victims on every coast in the U.S.
To limit your risk, avoid swimming if you have open cuts or scrapes on your body and avoid taking water into your mouth and nose.
Millions of people use freshwater and saltwater as a source of recreation each year and researchers are still scratching their heads as to why only a few people become infected from these types of organisms.
It is known that people with a liver disease have an 800% higher risk of contracting flesh eating disease and a death rate 200 times higher than those with healthy livers. Also at risk of this type of flesh eating infections are those with diabetes, HIV, thalassemia, cancer and those who regularly take antacids.
Early symptoms of necrotizing fasciitis include redness and/or swelling that rapidly spreads, fever, severe pain in the area and beyond, skin discoloration such as black spots, ulcers or blisters on the skin, and/or oozing pus. As the disease worsens, it may cause dizziness, fatigue, nausea and diarrhea. The disease spreads rapidly and death is typically related to sepsis and subsequent organ failure.
Another type of flesh eating infection, called Fournier's gangrene, occurs in the genital area of men and women. The bacteria usually enter the body through a cut and quickly spread.
Those particularly at risk for developing Fournier's gangrene are people with diabetes, since some glycemic control drugs used for Type 2 diabetes are known to cause Fournier’s gangrene.
Symptoms include tenderness, redness or swelling or having a fever above 100.4 degrees. The symptoms worsen quickly, so it is vital to seek immediate treatment.