We all know the dangers of swimming in lakes and rivers. In fact, we could encounter eddies, unexpected currents or even quicksand. Fresh water also tends to harbor unpleasant animals and parasites. Among the most common inconveniences for swimmers there are in fact too close encounters with gadflies, leeches or other annoying animals. But do you know that in some places something much more serious could happen to you? If you bathe in these rivers you could catch a terrible disease. Let’s see what it is.
It is a disease transmitted by insects
The disease in question is called onchocerciasis, but it is much more known as ‘river blindness’. This disease affects 15.5 million people worldwide, and nearly 800,000 have become Czech after contracting it. Most infections occur in sub-Saharan Africa, but there have also been cases in the Arabian Peninsula and South America. What unites all the places where there are cases of river blindness, is the presence of rivers that host a terrible parasite. If you bathe in these rivers you could catch a terrible disease.
River blindness is an infectious disease caused by a parasitic worm. It is a nematode. Nematodes are small ‘worms’ very common in nature. Some also haunt our gardens (here’s how to get rid of it).
The symptoms are also very serious
But there is a nematode (Onchocerca volvulus) which causes a very serious disease in humans. The larvae of this parasite can be transmitted through the bite of mosquitoes or flies.
If a person is bitten by an infected insect, the larvae enter his body. Here they begin to grow, until they reach the state of maturity as adult worms. When they are adults, the worms migrate to the surface of an infected person’s skin, and there they release other larvae. When a mosquito bites the person, they become infected, and the cycle begins again.
But one part of the body where the larvae particularly like to take refuge is the eyeball.
If a roundworm infestation reaches its advanced stage, the eyes fill with larvae, and the person can go blind.
There is no vaccine. The best solution is prevention. If you go to the tropics, stay away from rivers and use plenty of mosquito repellent!
