Pediculus humanus... body or head louse...
The body louse lives in the seams of clothes and is associated with war, famine, close living quarters, and elementary school. Today's post actually covers a disease of great historical significance. Please, read on...
1. Borreliae recurrentis-- humans are the reservoir, but lice are the vectors
- recurring fevers, just like the other Borrelia infections
2. Rickettsia prowazekii-- humans are the reservoir, but lice are the vectors
- TYPHUS!
- there are a few different types of typhus, each of which has different vectors, but epidemic typhus, which is transmitted by body louse, is the most serious
- the louse bite an infected person, the bacteria multiply within the louse belly, then it is excreted in feces when the louse is feeding on the next human, the human scratches the itchy louse bite, and any broken skin has now become a site of inefction
- a one to two week incubation period is followed by sustained high fevers, muscle aches, vasculitis, multiple organ disease, AND SKIN FINDINGS!
- also heart failure, shock, and death.
- early light rose colored macules start on trunk and spread to extremities, they blanche early, but later turn dull and red, they can spread everywhere but the palms and soles
- of course, with any vasculitis, you can get petechiae as well
- Wikipedia has a nice summary of the historical significance of typhus (all the historical figures killed by this disease and all the wars that it appeared in... which is pretty much every war up to World War II, when we got a vaccine)
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