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Meningitis risk in swimming pool Woman deceased after bathing
After a young woman in the US was taken to a clinic with symptoms such as headache, dizziness and nausea, her condition deteriorated rapidly. The doctors diagnosed meningitis. Shortly afterwards the patient died. Authorities later discovered that her death was related to bathing in a private swimming pool.
Young woman dies shortly after admission to hospital
In the US, a 21-year-old woman died of a rare disease caused by the "brain-eating" parasite Naegleria fowleri. A regional health spokesperson for Inyo County, California told CBS News, "The young woman first felt nausea and dizziness. After that followed a strong headache ". As the pain did not stop, the patient finally went to the Northern Inyo Hospital in Bishop, California.
There, the doctors diagnosed meningitis due to the typical symptoms, an inflammation of the meninges. At this time, the doctors were not yet aware of whether viruses or bacteria have caused the disease. Despite an immediate treatment, which was supposed to help regardless of the pathogen, the condition of the woman continued to worsen. Two days later, the patient was transferred to another hospital in Reno, Nevada. But even there she could not be helped. The young woman died a little later.
From the US, the case of a young woman who died after a meningitis is reported. The 21-year-old had apparently contracted the meningitis while bathing in a pool. (Image: volff / fotolia.com) Brain-eating parasite responsible for death
"We could not explain the death," said one of the senior physicians. "That's why a thorough investigation was ordered." When the United States Centers of Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) analyzed women's CSF and blood samples, the results showed that a brain-eating parasite resulted in the death of the young woman. The single-celled Naegleria fowleri, better known as the "brain-eating amoeba", lives in warm fresh water and is described in the medical textbooks as a pathogen that causes the so-called primary amoebic meningoencephalitis. The infection route in the current case initially remained unclear.
Swimming in the pool became a fatal accident
According to a team of scientists led by Jennifer Cope of the CDC after completing the investigations in the "Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report" of the disease control authority, infections with the unicellular organisms are almost always fatal. According to the news magazine "Spiegel", the experts found that in the two weeks prior to her death, the woman was swimming only once, in a private pool whose water had been added to chlorine just before swimming. According to the report, the pool is located in a desert area and the water coming from a mountain spring has covered the last 2.4 kilometers in a 1960s transmission line. According to the information, the top of the pipe was rusted in many places, so that in principle it had become a channel. According to the "Spiegel", the water at the spring was around ten degrees Celsius warm on the July day when the water samples were taken, but around 37 degrees at the entrance to the swimming pool. The woman had died in June.
Infections are extremely rare
Although the CDC had found no evidence of Naegleria fowleri either in the water of the swimming pool or in the pipe, it nevertheless assumes that the woman has become infected with the amoeba there. According to the authority, the case highlights the importance of paying attention to hygiene when operating a swimming pool. If this is properly maintained and disinfected, threatened in principle, no risk of infection. Naegleria fowleri occurs in almost all parts of the world, with the USA and Australia according to the CDC focus of dissemination. However, experts assume that many cases in developing and emerging countries are not recognized as such and therefore not reported. But infections are generally very rare.
"In the 10 years from 2005 to 2014, 35 infections were reported in the US, with 31 people being infected by swimming in contaminated recreational waters, three people following a nasal wash with contaminated tap water, and one person from contaminated tap water Backyard, "say the experts. According to the health department, a total of 133 people in the US have been infected with the particular parasite in the last 53 years. However, the death rate was very high. So far, only three people have been saved from death as a result of the infection. In Germany so far no cases have become known.
Pathogen spreads at temperatures above 30 degrees
According to the CDC, infection with Naegleria fowleri usually occurs when someone takes contaminated water through their nostrils while bathing or diving. In this way, the amoeba can migrate into the brain and trigger the life-threatening inflammation. By accidental ingestion or by drinking one can not be infected according to the CDC.
According to information from the Robert Koch Institute (RKI), the amoebae multiply especially at temperatures between 30 and 45 degrees Celsius. Therefore, the pathogen is particularly widespread in fresh waters and soils of the subtropics and tropics, but also in naturally or artificially heated freshwater temperate climates. In 2014, researchers in the journal PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases reported that more than 95 percent of known infections with Naegleria fowleri ended in death. (Ad)