Laura Gaither immediately removed the tiny black bugs that she felt biting her legs one afternoon at the Panama City Beach, three years ago. The local residents told her that they were probably sand flies. It wasn’t only Gaither who was bitten by these bugs; three of her children were bitten too. But since the bite marks only looked like something from ants or mosquitoes, she did not worry, as marks usually subside within a week. She was wrong to assume that, unfortunately. A couple weeks later, Gaither noticed the bites had turned into small open wounds.
They worsened over the next couple of weeks, but when she took her children to their pediatrician, “he just chalked it up to eczema,” Gaither said. Eventually Gaither took her young daughter, whose condition was the most concerning, to the emergency room at Children’s of Alabama, where she was tested for fungal and bacterial infections. The results came back negative, and the anti-fungal and steroid topical creams the doctors prescribed proved ineffective. Meanwhile, the ulcers kept growing larger and more painful.
This prompted Gaither to research what kind of disease struck her and her family, and she found out about the skin-disease called leishmaniasis. When she found photos of wounds caused by this disease, she found it similar to what she herself had at the time (Please don’t search it if you’re currently eating as you’re reading this). Unfortunately, the doctors dismissed the possibility of her contracting that disease, and it wasn’t until her knee wound worsened that she was able to convince her own physician to conduct a biopsy for leishmaniasis. The results were inconclusive, but fortunately, the wounds on her children were healed, and the ulcers cleared up, months after.
This is just one of many stories about people contracting leishmaniasis in the U.S., and scientists say that this is just the beginning.
Americans, it turns out, can be exposed to Leishmania parasites without leaving the country. The parasites are currently endemic in Texas and Oklahoma, and new studies suggest that they might be present in other states, including Florida. While reported cases of leishmaniasis contracted in the U.S. are currently negligible, they may soon be on the rise: As climate change pushes rodent and sand fly habitat northward, scientists caution that in the future, an increasing number of U.S. residents could be exposed to different varieties of the flesh-eating parasite.
Some strains of Leishmania parasites can be life-threatening. The one currently present in the U.S., Leishmania mexicana, induces milder symptoms and over time, can heal on its own. But if doctors fail to recognize it, or overreact to it, damages caused by wrong therapies and unnecessary toxic systemic medication can cause more harm than the disease itself.
Bridget McIlwee, an Illinois-based dermatologist, has treated patients who contracted leishmaniasis in Texas. She wants her colleagues to be more aware of the parasite’s expansion into the U.S. “It’s a pretty striking difference for a disease that we used to think of as limited to South America now extending as far north as Canada,” she said, “potentially within the next several decades.”
More about this over at Undark.
Scary.
(Image Credit: CDC/ Wikimedia Commons)