In the United States, a teenager died after swimming in Lake Mead, between Nevada and Arizona. And for good reason, he was the victim of an infection due to a “brain-eating amoeba”…
This is a rather unusual drama which happened to United States a few weeks ago. On September 30, a young boy was found dead after a bathing in the warm waters of Lake Mead, near Las Vegas, reported CNews, Monday, October 24. The teenager, a minor but whose precise age has not been communicated, died after being infected with a so-called “brain-eating” amoeba (called Naegleria fowleri in scientific jargon).
According The Parisian, this species is usually found in warm waters, from 25°C to 46°C. It is invisible to the naked eye and provokes in its victims primary amoebic meningoencephalitisthat is, a brain infection resembling a meningitis. Symptoms, which appear one to twelve days after exposure, are often headache, nausea, vomiting and fever. “It’s a very, very rare disease”said Brian Labus, a former public health epidemiologist, when asked by Associated Press. “I would not say that we should ring the alarm bell”continued the specialist, before simply calling people to “be smart about it when they are in places where this amoeba lives”.
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Only one case recorded in France
In the United States, the American CDC (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) has identified 154 cases of infection and death due to this amoeba since 1962. In August 2022, a child lost his life after catching an infection caused by Naegleria fowleri in a river in Nebraska. In 2020, another child had already died in Texas and, a year earlier, an American was contaminated in a water park before dying a few days later. In France, only one case has been identified by the National Health Security Agency. It dates from 2008. A young boy had actually been infected with the bacteria after swimming in a pool of hot water in Guadeloupe. He had then suffered a lightning meningitis, according to The Parisian.