Diseases to humans.

magnum4 · Post by **magnum4** » 23 Oct 2003, 20:10

This question is aimed at all of you who are out there collecting you catfish yourselves. There has been talk latley about trips of this nature and i've just read a good book which disscusses such travles; Last chance to see by Douglas Adams and Mark Carwardine. (not many fish though apart from the Baiji dolphin)

My question is which diseases do humans stand a chance to catch, have any of you stories which you would rather not share?

Post by **Silurus** » 23 Oct 2003, 20:29

You mean diseases you catch as a result of field work? I've suffered food poisoning and have been stung, but thankfully have not caught any diseases from fieldwork (of course, it's possible that I might have melioidosis-causing bacteria lying dormant inside of me, but that's something I don't want to think about).
Might catch a dose of chloroquine-resistant malaria this December if my luck is bad, since I'll be heading to an area where it's endemic.

magnum4 · Post by **magnum4** » 23 Oct 2003, 20:42

No bilharzia thats good just possible;

chloroquine-resistant malaria

Post by **Shane** » 24 Oct 2003, 00:18

Two other things that I seem to collect are tropical ailments and innoculations. Lots of food poisoning. Salmonella once (that was bad, two weeks in the hospital), but the absolute worse was Dengue Fever. The Denegue, known as Breakbone Fever in English, had me down for a month and it was about another 45 days before I was fully recovered. HH has had Dengue twice I believe. If a US Government employee gets Dengue twice, they are not allowed to work in the tropics any longer. There are four strains of Dengue and one is hemorrhagic causing you to bleed to death through your eyes, nose, and ears if you do not get a blood transfusion. Once you have had Dengue twice, your chances are 50/50 that it will be hemorhagic the third time.
The thing is that there are more undescribed tropical parasites and bacteria than undescribed fishes. Most of the time you will never know what you had. Just pass the rum and cipro! Joking aside, I am home to write this, vice at work, as I am currently fighting off a nasty amoeba I picked up somewhere. I do want to state these maladies were all from living in the tropics and not directly from collecting fishes. I can not think of a specific disease that I ever contracted from collecting. Oh yeah, I had a spider bite me on the ass as I was sleeping in my hammock one time in the Venezuelan llanos. Swelled up like a golf ball. I guess that was not directly related to collecting either.
-Shane
Maybe Jools will read this and post his St. Paddys Day feet shot from Venezuela. I love that photo. I know it is on the forum somewhere...

Post by **Silurus** » 24 Oct 2003, 01:11

Actually, I cannot remember whether I had dengue twice or thrice. Sure hope it's not the latter, as it'll mean the next time I get it, it'll definitely be hemorrhagic.
One thing I'm glad I'm not is a herpetologist. Scientists working on snakes have died from being bitten by venomous snakes they were collecting, the most well-known recent case being that of Joe Slowinski.

JohnnyOscar · Post by **JohnnyOscar** » 24 Oct 2003, 20:00

I caught a rare strongiloides species in Aceh, possibly from the orangutans I was trailing. Also amoebic dysentry (several times), possible dengue fever and various low fevers.

I've also had some stupidly close encounters with wild animals while crawling through the bush on my hands and knees, including tigers (often), bears

, pigs, pig-tailed macaques

, orangutans, various snakes and seriously poisonous caterpillars. It keeps things interesting.

Post by **Barbie** » 24 Oct 2003, 22:29

Methinks maybe my definition of interesting and yours differs a wee bit! To me, a tank full of cichlids, plecos, or synos, are interesting. Fevers and other maladies just aren't going to be listed in the same category!

Hopefully you'll feel better soon Shane. That sounds like the pits.

Any chance of you just skipping the third or more time HH?

Barbie

Post by **Silurus** » 24 Oct 2003, 22:33

Any chance of you just skipping the third or more time HH?

Sure, if I move to more temperate climes permanently and stop doing field work altogether. ;)
But that'd be like asking me to chop off an arm or something (actually given the two to choose, I'd opt for the latter anytiime). ;)
There's no way I'm afraid. Short of making myself mosquito-proof (since you never which of the mosquitoes biting you is carrying the disease).

S. Allen · Post by **S. Allen** » 25 Oct 2003, 00:35

yikes, many unpleasant things... anyone ever cursed with a botfly? I saw a particularly unpleasant picture of one the other day... being removed from the tissue just under the eye of a child... ick.

JohnnyOscar · Post by **JohnnyOscar** » 25 Oct 2003, 07:39

Silurus wrote:
Short of making myself mosquito-proof.

Have you ever heard of the old pawangs' trick of eating young papaya leaves and flowers every day? The leaves taste horrible, but are supposed to make your skin taste nasty to mosquitos. I also I heard (western) people swear by vitamin supplements. I think it is one of the B vitamins, but don't quote me on that.

ClayT101 · Post by **ClayT101** » 25 Oct 2003, 11:07

All I know is if you are in the Amazon, don't urinate underwater (especially if you are a guy). Not a disease, but painfull non the less

magnum4 · Post by **magnum4** » 25 Oct 2003, 21:23

clay you stand just as much chance of being a victim of that which i can not speeak of regardless of sex!

ps why did you have to lower the tone bringing that up i'm gonna have nightmares now!

Post by **Shane** » 25 Oct 2003, 23:02

You can both rest easy. The myth of the Candiru is just that, an old wives tale to scare Gringos. Read Stephen Spotte's "Candiru: Life and Legend of the Bloodsucking Catfishes." A very poor scientific work because he started out with the thesis that Candiru attack people and then went about trying to prove it. Even he admitted that all of his experiments were failures and the only SINGLE case of a Doctor treating a Candiru patient that he found was clearly bogus. Spotte's witness would have us believe that a guy was urinating from the riverbank and the catfish swam up the man's urine stream and into his penis. If you believe that tall tale, I have some beautiful ocean front property in Arizona for sale. I used to ask the natives about this legend everywhere I went, but stopped because I got tired of them laughing at me and saying, "Damn, where the hell do you gringos get such stupid ideas."
-Shane

magnum4 · Post by **magnum4** » 26 Oct 2003, 00:08

The rumer i read appart from that one shane. I think there is a link to this story from PC.
the one were a scientist put candiru next to a cut on his arm and it went straight into his vain.

Don't no about you but i still wouldn't piss in those waters wouldn't like to be the first.

Post by **Silurus** » 26 Oct 2003, 00:59

This is the only single recent case reported.
The chance of this happening is still as rare as hen's teeth.

S. Allen · Post by **S. Allen** » 26 Oct 2003, 01:14

actually, the discovery channel runs a show on parasites every few months, I've seen it twice now, but it does have a substantiated case of a candiru wangal attack... more recent then the book you mentioned and I believe they've got the specimen preserved somewhere.... Not sure where you'd find all the info on the show though.

Post by **Shane** » 26 Oct 2003, 04:22

HH,
That is the same case Spotte cites. I want to meet the ichthyologist that can duplicate the experiment and show a Trichtomycterid swim up out of the water and through a urine stream! Anyone else disturbed by the fact that it plays "Dust In The Wind" while you look at the photos?
-Shane

YouTube · Post by **Jools** » 15 Feb 2011, 19:19

Shane wrote:Maybe Jools will read this and post his St. Paddys Day feet shot from Venezuela. I love that photo. I know it is on the forum somewhere...

http://www.dignall.com/gallery/v/jools/ ... G.jpg.html

Jools

grokefish · Post by **grokefish** » 15 Feb 2011, 19:27

Ouch!

YouTube · Post by **Jools** » 15 Feb 2011, 19:30

Lesson being, don't drink Guinness bare footed in the Llanos.

Solution was to stand in a bowl of vinegar. Certainly stopped the itching.

Jools

exasperatus2002 · Post by **exasperatus2002** » 15 Feb 2011, 20:40

Jools wrote:
Shane wrote:Maybe Jools will read this and post his St. Paddys Day feet shot from Venezuela. I love that photo. I know it is on the forum somewhere...
http://www.dignall.com/gallery/v/jools/ ... G.jpg.html

Jools

New movie....When mosquito's attack!!! Starring Jools.

andywoolloo · Post by **andywoolloo** » 16 Feb 2011, 07:17

ouch! was that from fire ants?

YouTube · Post by **Jools** » 16 Feb 2011, 11:15

Well, if I knew what it was, I'd not have let them do it!

Jools

Viktor Jarikov · Post by **Viktor Jarikov** » 16 Feb 2011, 15:23

It took 8 years, Jools, but you have made it!

I've recently posted a related question about leptospirosis bacteria to Shane's thread. See post #13 here http://www.planetcatfish.com/forum/view ... 26&t=31849

...which sounds like a day in the park vs. Dengue fever... though it does kill 1% (?) of those who get it.

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