Infection From Brain-Eating Amoeba Kills Boy in South Carolina

Health|Infection From Brain-Eating Amoeba Kills Boy in South Carolina

A 12-year-old boy died last week in South Carolina from a rare brain-eating amoeba he contracted after swimming in a local reservoir, a lawyer for the boy’s family said in a statement on Thursday.

Jaysen Carr, a middle school student, contracted the deadly infectious amoeba after swimming in Lake Murray, a reservoir roughly 15 miles from Columbia, S.C., the law firm of Tyler D. Bailey said on Facebook. Jaysen died on July 18.

In a briefing on Thursday, Prisma Health Children’s Hospital in South Carolina confirmed that Jaysen died from Naegleria fowleri, a brain-eating amoeba that thrives in warm freshwater.

It was not immediately clear when he had gone swimming. Dominion Energy, which owns the lake and runs recreational access to it, could not be immediately reached on Saturday.

The amoeba is “ubiquitous to any fresh water in the state of South Carolina” and much of the Southeastern United States, Anna-Kathryn Burch, a doctor of pediatric infectious diseases, said at the briefing.

As the weather heats up, the number of amoeba in the water increase while water levels decrease. That is often when infections occur.

Though it is nearly always fatal, the amoeba is rarely contracted, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

There were 167 reported infections in the United States between 1962 and 2024. All but four cases were fatal, according to the C.D.C.

“For most people who come in contact with this type of amoeba, it causes no harm whatsoever,” Dr. Burch said. “Most of us have been exposed to this amoeba.”

People cannot be infected by drinking water containing the amoeba or by other exposures, unless water goes into the nose, according to the C.D.C.

Infections are hard to detect because they are so rare, but headaches, fever, nausea, and vomiting can all be symptoms, according to the C.D.C.

The amoeba gets its nickname from the way it destroys brain tissue, using the brain as a food source after being forced up the sinuses through a rush of water. When the microbe is in the water, it feasts on bacteria.

The organism is typically found in warm freshwater lakes and rivers, and contracted by swimming.

Among recent cases, a child died of an infection caused by Naegleria fowleri in 2022 after swimming in a river in Nebraska.

A 6-year-old boy on the Gulf Coast of Texas died in 2020 after being exposed to the amoeba from a water hose at his home or a city splash pad, where children play in the warmer months.

And in 2019, a North Carolina man died of the infection after visiting a local water park. The year prior, a New Jersey man died after visiting a different water park in Waco, Texas.

But the C.D.C. said that infections from water parks and splash pads are rare and only happen when the water is not sufficiently chlorinated.

Infections have also been linked to the use of neti pots and other nasal irrigation devices.

A 71-year-old Texas woman died last year after using a nasal irrigation device filled with tap water from an R.V. on a campground in Texas, according to a C.D.C. report published in May.

Tap water is not safe for rinsing nasal passages, according to the Food and Drug Administration, which recommends the use of filtered, boiled or otherwise sterilized water instead.