A Brazilian man with elephantiasis, a rare condition in which people's limbs become discolored and swell to enormous sizes, was recently featured on the popular Animal Planet show "River Monsters," which often films in tropical, heavily forested locales.
As the name "elephantiasis" implies, the condition causes a person's limb to resemble that of an elephant.
Elephantiasis is actually a complication of a parasitic infection called lymphatic filariasis. More than 120 million people in 73 countries have this infection, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
The worm-like parasites that cause the infection are spread by mosquito bites, said Dr. Amesh Adalja, an infectious-disease specialist and a senior associate at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center's Center for Health Security.
However, most people who become infected with the parasites do not have any symptoms, Adalja told Live Science. And only some develop long-term symptoms, such as elephantiasis, he said. It's unclear why some people go on to develop elephantiasis and others do not, he added.
0 comments: