Brain-eating parasite discovered in drinking water of Louisiana

Sean Waters in the Standard Daily: Naegleria fowleri, a deadly brain-eating amoeba is currently under investigations in the recent death of a Minnesota teen, following findings that the single-celled organism is now thriving in northern US waters due to help from climate change.

Climate change is causing the summers to get hotter at this period, and this amoeba is known to thrive in warmer waters of southern United States – according to Dr. Bruce Hirsch, an infectious diseases specialist at North Shore University Hospital in Manhasset, NY. “Climate change may be playing a role,” Hirsch said.

And then the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) says the amoeba is “heat-loving.” Despite the fact that the Naegleria fowleri common in several US rivers and lakes, the chances of getting infected with it inside your brain are low, and the CDC said only 35 people were infected between 2005-2014 within the US.

The CDC further revealed that the deadly amoeba causes the amebic meningoencephalitis, an infection that destroys brain tissues. While people cannot get infected with the parasite by drinking contaminated water, it does get into the human body through the nose, from where it finds its way into the brain....

Histopathology of amebic meningoencephalitis due to Naegleria fowleri. Direct fluorescent antibody stain. Via the CDC

March of the pathogens: Parasite metabolism can foretell disease ranges under climate change

Morgan Kelly in News at Princeton: Knowing the temperatures that viruses, bacteria, worms and all other parasites need to grow and survive could help determine the future range of infectious diseases under climate change, according to new research.

Princeton University researchers developed a model that can identify the prospects for nearly any disease-causing parasite as the Earth grows warmer, even if little is known about the organism. Their method calculates how the projected temperature change for an area would alter the creature's metabolism and life cycle, the researchers report in the journal Ecology Letters.

Lead author Péter Molnár, a Princeton postdoctoral researcher of ecology and evolutionary biology, explained that the technique is an all-inclusive complement to current methods of predicting how climate change will affect disease, which call for a detailed knowledge of the environmental factors a specific parasite needs to thrive. But for many parasites, that information doesn't exist.

The more general Princeton model is based on the metabolic theory of ecology. Under this premise, all biological organisms need a balance between body size and body temperature to maintain the metabolism that keeps their organs functioning. Like any cold-blooded creature, disease-causing parasites rely on external temperatures for this balance. Scientists with knowledge of a parasite's body size and life cycle could use the Princeton metabolic model to predict how the organism would fare in altered climates.

"Our framework is applicable to pretty much any parasite, and utilizes established metabolic patterns shown to hold across a wide variety of species," Molnár said. "It would be impossible to ever gather enough data to develop a separate climate-change model for each existing and emerging disease in humans, wildlife and livestock," Molnár said. "With our physiological approach, many of the parameters for a specific pathogen can be predicted based on what is known about metabolic processes in all parasites, so that the model remains applicable to new and less-studied species as well."...

A cameo by the Marburg virus, image from the CDC