Health
Brain-eating amoeba may be from sinus rinse
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A person in Charlotte County, Florida, has died after being infected with the rare brain-eating amoeba Naegleria fowleri.
The infection possibly resulted from “sinus rinse practices utilizing tap water,” according to a news release from the Florida Department of Health in Charlotte County. The release was issued in February to alert the public about the infection.
On Thursday, the department confirmed that the infected person has died and officials are continuing to investigate the case.
“An Epidemiological investigation is being conducted to understand the unique circumstances of this infection. I can confirm the infection unfortunately resulted in a death, and any additional information on this case is confidential to protect patient privacy,” Jae Williams, press secretary for the Florida Department of Health, said in an emailed statement.
Infection with Naegleria fowleri “can only happen when water contaminated with amoebae enters the body through the nose,” according to the department’s news release.
The Florida Department of Health in Charlotte County warned residents to only use distilled or sterile water when making sinus rinse solutions. Tap water should be boiled for at least a minute and cooled before using it for sinus rinsing, which typically involves a neti pot.
Tap water that has not been sterilized isn’t safe to use as a nasal rinse since it’s not adequately filtered or treated, and so it may contain low levels of microorganisms, such as bacteria and protozoa, including amoebas, according to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s website. Yet people cannot be infected by drinking tap water, as stomach acid typically kills those organisms.
WHAT IS THE BRAIN-EATING AMOEBA?
Naegleria fowleri is an amoeba, a single-celled living organism, that can be found in soil and warm freshwater, such as lakes, rivers and hot springs throughout the United States. Commonly called the “brain-eating amoeba,” it can cause brain infections, which typically happens when amoeba-containing water travels up through the nose, such as while swimming.
According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, about three people in the United States get infected each year, and these infections are usually deadly.
From 1962 to 2021, only four out of 154 people in the United States survived a brain-eating amoeba infection, according to the CDC. Just last year, a boy died who was infected after swimming at Lake Mead, another child in Nebraska died who was infected after swimming, and a Missouri resident died with the infection after visiting a beach in Iowa.
Signs and symptoms of infection are initially severe headaches, fever, nausea and vomiting and they can progress to a stiff neck, seizures, hallucinations, and coma. The infection is treated with a combination of drugs, including the antibiotic azithromycin, the antifungal fluconazole, the antimicrobial drug miltefosine and the corticosteroid dexamethasone.
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Grande Prairie RCMP issued a warning Friday after it was revealed fentanyl linked to a deadly overdose was mixed with a chemical that doesn’t respond to naloxone treatment.
The drugs were initially seized on Feb. 28 after a fatal overdose, and this week, Health Canada reported back to Mounties that the fentanyl had been mixed with Bromazolam, which is a benzodiazepine.
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Mounties say this is the first recorded instance of Bromazolam in Alberta. The drug has previously been linked to nine fatal overdoses in New Brunswick in 2022.
The pills seized in Alberta were oval-shaped and stamped with “20” and “SS,” though Mounties say it can come in other forms.
Naloxone treatment, given in many cases of opioid toxicity, is not effective in reversing the effects of Bromazalam, Mounties said, and therefore, any fentanyl mixed with the benzodiazepine “would see a reduced effectiveness of naloxone, requiring the use of additional doses and may still result in a fatality.”
From January to November of last year, there were 1,706 opioid-related deaths in Alberta, and 57 linked to benzodiazepine, up from 1,375 and 43, respectively, in 2022.
Mounties say officers responded to about 1,100 opioid-related calls for service, last year with a third of those proving fatal. RCMP officers also used naloxone 67 times while in the field, a jump of nearly a third over the previous year.
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Health
CFIA continues surveillance for HPAI in cattle, while sticking with original name for disease – RealAgriculture
The Canada Food Inspection Agency will continue to refer to highly pathogenic avian influenza in cattle as HPAI in cattle, and not refer to it as bovine influenza A virus (BIAV), as suggested by the American Association of Bovine Practitioners earlier this month.
Dr. Martin Appelt, senior director for the Canadian Food Inspection Agency, in the interview below, says at this time Canada will stick with “HPAI in cattle” when referencing the disease that’s been confirmed in dairy cattle in multiple states in the U.S.
The CFIA’s naming policy is consistent with the agency’s U.S. counterparts’, as the U.S. Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service has also said it will continue referring to it as HPAI or H5N1.
Appelt explains how the CFIA is learning from the U.S. experience to-date, and how it is working with veterinarians across Canada to stay vigilant for signs of the disease in dairy and beef cattle.
As of April 19, there has not been a confirmed case of HPAI in cattle in Canada. Appelt says it’s too soon to say if an eventual positive case will significantly restrict animal movement, as is the case with positive poultry cases.
This is a major concern for the cattle industry, as beef cattle especially move north and south across the U.S. border by the thousands. Appelt says that CFIA will address an infection in each species differently in conjunction with how the disease is spread and the threat to neighbouring farms or livestock.
Currently, provincial dairy organizations have advised producers to postpone any non-essential tours of dairy barns, as a precaution, in addition to other biosecurity measures to reduce the risk of cattle contracting HPAI.
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Health
Toronto reports 2 more measles cases. Use our tool to check the spread in Canada – Toronto Star
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Canada has seen a concerning rise in measles cases in the first months of 2024.
By the third week of March, the country had already recorded more than three times the number of cases as all of last year. Canada had just 12 cases of measles in 2023, up from three in 2022.
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