The woman contracted a fatal infection caused by a brain-eating amoeba and died eight days after developing symptoms.
A Texas woman died from an infection caused by a brain-eating amoeba days after she cleaned her sinuses using tap water, according to a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention case report.
The woman, an otherwise healthy 71-year-old, developed “severe neurologic symptoms,” including fever, headache and an altered mental status, four days after she filled a nasal irrigation device with tap water from her RV’s water system at a Texas campsite, the CDC report said.
She was treated for primary amebic meningoencephalitis — a brain infection caused by Naegleria fowleri, often referred to as the “brain-eating amoeba.” Despite treatment, the woman experienced seizures and died from the infection eight days after she developed symptoms, the agency said.
Well, they’re not sure if the water came directly from the RV tank or the local water supply, so it certainly could have been tap water.
Sounds like the general idea is also just don’t use tap water directly out of the tap if you want to run water through your sinuses (which is where these infections come from). They aren’t saying that tap water is unsafe to drink. I don’t see this as fear mongering at all.