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Mahesh

05/07/24 18:59 PM IST

Rare and fatal brain-eating amoeba infection

In News
  • A 12-year-old boy, E.P. Mridul, from Feroke in Kozhikode district of Kerala, who had been undergoing treatment for primary amoebic meningoencephalitis (PAM) at a private hospital, died recently.
About PAM
  • PAM is caused by Naegleria fowleri, an amoeba that thrives in warm freshwater lakes, ponds and rivers.
  • It can also survive in poorly maintained swimming pools in rare cases.
  • Because it can infect the brain and destroy the tissues, this one-celled organism is also called ‘brain-eating amoeba’.
  • These infections, though rare, are fatal and 97% of the patients don’t survive. 
  • The infection happens when people go for a swim in lakes, ponds or rivers, during summer.
  • Experts say that it could occur if the atmospheric temperature is high and the water levels are low.
  • The amoeba enters the body through the nose and reaches up to the brain.
  • It destroys brain tissues and causes their swelling. In recent cases, children are found more vulnerable to it. 
Symptoms
  • According to the Centre for Disease Control (CDC) in the United States, headache, fever, nausea, and vomiting are its early symptoms.
  • The progress can happen rapidly. Stiff neck, confusion, lack of attention to people and surroundings, loss of balance, and hallucinations are the later symptoms.
  • Most people die within one to 18 days. It usually leads to coma and death after five days, says the CDC. 
Treatment
  • The infection can be diagnosed through lab tests. However since it is a rare infection, the detection can sometimes be hard.
  • In Kozhikode, the doctors at the Government Medical College Hospital suspected its possibility in the five-year-old girl from Malappuram after she exhibited symptoms similar to that of bacterial meningitis.
  • There are no standard treatment methods available in the country and the doctors are following the guidelines of the CDC now.
Source- The Hindu

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