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Report of an Outbreak of "Swimmers' Itch"

SQUADRON-LEADER J. C. MITCHELL

AMA Arch Derm Syphilol. 1954;70(6):805-808.

	Since this article does not have an abstract, we have provided the first 150 words of the full text PDF and any section headings.

FIFTY-THREE picnickers, affected in this outbreak, were members of a small community, and available for early examination, and follow-up.

The natural history of the condition, which was first described by Cort¹ from Michigan, is briefly as follows: Cercariae pass from snail to fish; the fish is eaten by a bird and the organism reenters the lakewater from the birds' droppings. Cercariae from the snail may infest man instead of fish and give rise to a skin eruption; man is an unsatisfactory host, and the cercaria dies after penetrating the human epidermis.

Eighty-eight persons bathed in Lake Nipissing, Ontario on June 20, 1953; 63 were under the age of 10 years.

SKIN MANIFESTATIONS

Early Manifestations.—Forty-five persons started itching at times ranging between 10 minutes and three hours after leaving the water. Seven persons stated that they started itching while in the water and one person did not notice itching . . . [Full Text PDF of this Article]

Author Affiliations
ROYAL CANADIAN AIR FORCE

From Royal Canadian Air Force Hospital, Rockcliffe, Ottawa. Biopsy study by Dr. H. J. Barrie, Department of Pathology, University of Toronto. Identification of snail by Dr. L. S. Russell, National Museum of Canada, Ottawa.

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