2 ms·

A quick look at the Wikipedia article and the BC CDC website seem to indicate that intravenous antifungals are effective, although removal of infected portions

by donw 17y ago

A quick look at the Wikipedia article and the BC CDC website seem to indicate that intravenous antifungals are effective, although removal of infected portions of lung tissue is sometimes required. Digging through the CDC website now; looks like the first cases appeared around 1999, and that it's a fairly rare disease. So, as always if you've got a cough that's stuck around for awhile, see a doctor. Fungi are nasty things when they get in the human body, because just like human cells, fungi are eukaryotes, and so a lot of the tricks that work against bacteria don't come into play.

tokenadult 17y ago
looks like the first cases appeared around 1999, and that it's a fairly rare disease. [original research?] Oddly, I actually know someone here in the United States who had an infection like that more than a decade earlier, after travel to a tropical country. There probably wasn't such elaborate genetic testing for specific strains available in those days, so the infection was only classified as to genus, Cryptococcus, in that patient. The infection was so puzzling to the doctors at a major metropolitan research and teaching hospital that treated the patient that even the hospital's director of infectious disease gave the patient a bedside visit. AFTER EDIT: From another news story, a link to the PLoS report on the newly reported strain of Cryptococcus: http://www.plospathogens.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.ppat.1000850 http://www.plospathogens.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2F... This link http://www.cdc.gov/ncidod/eid/vol4no1/buchanan.htm http://www.cdc.gov/ncidod/eid/vol4no1/buchanan.htm on the related fungal species Cryptococcus neoformans describes why usually fungi of this genus are not particularly pathogenic and what characteristics of Cryptococcus fungi most influence disease virulence.
- gort 17y ago
  Interesting. Cryptococcus neoformans is a relatively common cause of fungal infection.

by donw 17y ago

tokenadult 17y ago

looks like the first cases appeared around 1999, and that it's a fairly rare disease. [original research?] Oddly, I actually know someone here in the United States who had an infection like that more than a decade earlier, after travel to a tropical country. There probably wasn't such elaborate genetic testing for specific strains available in those days, so the infection was only classified as to genus, Cryptococcus, in that patient. The infection was so puzzling to the doctors at a major metropolitan research and teaching hospital that treated the patient that even the hospital's director of infectious disease gave the patient a bedside visit. AFTER EDIT: From another news story, a link to the PLoS report on the newly reported strain of Cryptococcus: http://www.plospathogens.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.ppat.1000850 http://www.plospathogens.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2F... This link http://www.cdc.gov/ncidod/eid/vol4no1/buchanan.htm http://www.cdc.gov/ncidod/eid/vol4no1/buchanan.htm on the related fungal species Cryptococcus neoformans describes why usually fungi of this genus are not particularly pathogenic and what characteristics of Cryptococcus fungi most influence disease virulence.

gort 17y ago
Interesting. Cryptococcus neoformans is a relatively common cause of fungal infection.