Study Shows Bed Bugs Can Transmit Parasite that Causes Chagas Disease

[Shiloh]

Source: http://www.uphs.upenn.edu/news/News_Releases/2014/11/levy/


News Release
November 17, 2014
Penn Study Shows Bed Bugs Can Transmit Parasite that Causes Chagas Disease
Like the "Kissing" Bug, Bed Bugs Can Transmit Deadly Parasite Via Feces

PHILADELPHIA ? The bed bug may be just as dangerous as its sinister cousin, the triatomine, or ?kissing? bug. A new study from Penn Medicine researchers in the Center for Clinical Epidemiology and Biostatistics demonstrated that bed bugs, like the triatomines, can transmit Trypanosoma cruzi, the parasite that causes Chagas disease, one of the most prevalent and deadly diseases in the Americas...

 

[Shiloh]

Re: Study Shows Bed Bugs Can Transmit Parasite that Causes Chagas Disease

Source: http://www.scientificamerican.com/a...-bugs-linked-to-deadly-chagas-disease-in-u-s/


Bed Bugs, Kissing Bugs Linked to Deadly Chagas Disease in U.S.
Risk may still be low, but findings lead scientists to call for better studies
December 10, 2014 |By Jennifer Frazer

Every year, the hearts of millions of Central and South Americans are quietly damaged by parasites. During the night, insects called kissing bugs emerge by the hundreds from hiding places in people?s mud and stick homes to bite their sleeping victims. The bugs defecate near the punctured skin and wriggling wormlike parasites in this poop may enter the wound and head for their victims' hearts. There, in about a third of victims, they damage the organs for decades before causing potentially lethal heart disease. Around 12,000 people worldwide die each year from the ailment, called Chagas disease...