Worm That Jumps From Rats to Slugs to Human Brains Has Invaded Southeast US
Freeman writes:
The dreaded rat lungworm-a parasite with a penchant for rats and slugs that occasionally finds itself rambling and writhing in human brains-has firmly established itself in the Southeast US and will likely continue its rapid invasion, a study published this week suggests.
The study involved small-scale surveillance of dead rats in the Atlanta zoo. Between 2019 and 2022, researchers continually turned up evidence of the worm. In all, the study identified seven out of 33 collected rats (21 percent) with evidence of a rat lungworm infection. The infected animals were spread throughout the study's time frame, all in different months, with one in 2019, three in 2021, and three in 2022, indicating sustained transmission.
Although small, the study "suggests that the zoonotic parasite was introduced to and has become established in a new area of the southeastern United States," the study's authors, led by researchers at the University of Georgia College of Veterinary Medicine, concluded. The study was published Wednesday in the journal Emerging Infectious Diseases.
[...] When a rat lungworm finds itself in a human, it does what it usually does in rats-it heads to the central nervous system and brain. Sometimes the migration of the worms to the central nervous system is asymptomatic or only causes mild transient symptoms. But, sometimes, they cause severe neurological dysfunction. This can start with nonspecific symptoms like headache, light sensitivity, and insomnia and develop into neck stiffness and pain, tingling or burning of the skin, double vision, bowel or bladder difficulties, and seizures. In severe cases, it can cause nerve damage, paralysis, coma, and even death.
It's often thought that the worm can't complete its life cycle in humans and that it ends up idly wandering around the brain for a month or two before it's eventually killed off by immune responses. However, there has been some evidence of adult worms reaching the human lungs.
Regardless, there's no specific treatment for a rat lungworm infection. No anti-parasitic drugs have proven effective, and, in fact, there's some evidence they can make symptoms worse by spurring more immune responses to dying worms. For now, supportive treatment, pain medications, and steroids are typically the only options.
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