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View Full Version : Shallow Water Hazard


ricki
06-01-2008, 07:40 AM
I've heard about this for years, since my diving days in freshwater lakes before they were filled in? Apparently it has been identified for over 70 years impacting 121 people. 2007 was an active year, even an adult wakeboarder was killed in Texas among six others including three boys in the Orlando area. It involves an amoeba boring into your brain gaining entry through your nose from shallow freshwater sediments. Symptoms can include including cephalgia (headache), nausea, and rigidity of the neck muscles, progressing to vomiting, delirium, seizures, and eventually irreversible coma. Death usually occurs within 14 days of exposure as a result of respiratory failure. Treatment doesn't seem to be all that effective at this time.

More at:
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/nationworld/sfl-flaswimmers0530sbmay30,0,5139757.story

http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/mm5721a1.htm