What can you get infected while swimming and how to avoid it

2024 Author: Malcolm Clapton | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 03:44

Not all water is created equal. In rivers and lakes, microorganisms float with you, which want to hurt you. It's time to find out who they are and how and how not to meet them.

How can you get infected in water

Basically, a variety of intestinal infections and skin diseases, which are caused by all possible types of microorganisms, are caught in the water.

Mikhail Lebedev Consultant Physician, Center for Molecular Diagnostics (CMD), Central Research Institute of Epidemiology, Rospotrebnadzor

Summer is the peak incidence of such infections in the middle lane. Indeed, the beach sand is inhabited by protozoa, pathogenic fungi, helminths (worms), and various bacteria.

We know that "before, everyone swam, and there was nothing." If you think so, just look at the list of surprises in the water.

Giardiasis

Giardia - these are the simplest microorganisms, of which there are quite a few around us. In places where feces and waste water get into the water, there are even more of them. They cling to us if we drink contaminated water or swallow it while swimming. Immediately after the swim, nothing happens, the first signs appear after 1–2 weeks.

Symptoms are typical for all intestinal infections: diarrhea, nausea, abdominal pain. The danger is severe dehydration of the body. It is treated with antibiotics and diet.

Cryptosporidiosis

Another parasitic disease with greetings from animals and similar symptoms: diarrhea, abdominal pain, fever. It appears 2-10 days after infection. If the immune system is not suppressed by HIV infection or other chronic diseases, everything will go away by itself.

Rotaviruses

Those who once had rotavirus (aka intestinal flu) hate fast diets. Diarrhea, vomiting, high fever and complete lack of energy are signs of infection that can be picked up in water. There are vaccinations for the virus, but there is no specific treatment, which means that you can only endure and alleviate the symptoms.

Hepatitis

Hepatitis A and E are viral infections that are transmitted through drinking water. Basically, of course, residents of hot countries suffer from them, but they also get sick in our country. We have already written about what hepatitis is and how to protect oneself from them.

Cholera

This is a particularly dangerous infection and one of the world's global problems. It seems that cholera is sick only in hot countries with a low culture of sanitation, but in fact, cholera pathogens are regularly found in Russia. In fact, cholera can be treated quickly and easily in most cases, and its main danger is dehydration due to severe diarrhea.

Dysentery, salmonellosis, escherichiosis

These are different diseases with different pathogens, but with generally similar symptoms: diarrhea, abdominal pain, nausea and fever. There are slight differences between them, but they are not fundamental. The main thing is that all these diseases are dangerous in the same way as cholera is dangerous: dehydration and all its serious consequences. They are also treated according to the same scheme: restoration of water balance, antibiotics and intestinal sorbents.

Leptospirosis

A dangerous bacterial infection that is transmitted from animals affects the liver and kidneys. It begins with a headache, high fever, and abdominal pain. Other symptoms are red eyes and jaundice. It can end very sadly. Bacteria more easily enter the bloodstream through wounds and mucous membranes.

Bather's itch

There are such parasites - schistosomes that live in waterfowl. Their larvae are called cercariae, and they do not mind clinging to humans. True, they will not be able to parasitize on us and will die, but allergic reactions, itching and red spots will have to be treated by a dermatologist.

Other infections

These are not all waterborne diseases. In the middle lane, it is difficult to find typhoid fever or the causative agent of trachoma (this is a disease that affects the eyes). But in warm regions, they are in considerable quantities. Worm infestations are rarely transmitted by swimming, but in dirty waters there is a chance to pick them up.

What can not be contaminated in water

One of the most common horror stories, in which many continue to believe, is the chance of contracting gonorrhea, syphilis, chlamydia or other STIs while bathing, notes Mikhail Lebedev. But this is a myth. If you just swim and do not have sex in the water, you will not get infected with specific infections.

STIs are transmitted only from person to person and sexually. Moreover, it is impossible to catch heapitis B or HIV infection while bathing.

Mikhail Lebedev

Fear number two is to chill yourself on something, like kidneys. There is little basis for this fear. Our body temperature is maintained from the inside, and if the body is supercooled from summer bathing, then the whole thing. Hypothermia can be an additional factor for the development of diseases, but certainly not the main one.

It is quite difficult without concomitant pathology. But hypothermia while swimming can serve as one of the reasons for the development of cystitis.

Alexey Moskalenko, pediatrician of the DOC + service

How to swim so as not to get sick

All the horrors described above do not mean that it is not necessary to climb into the water at all. It is enough to follow the rules of bathing.

The swimming place should be clean at least visually, and even on the shore. Standing water is much more dangerous than running water. Do not go into the water among thickets of marsh plants, sinking knee-deep in mud.

If you want to swim in an artificial reservoir where the water is renewed slowly (in a pond or pit) and in which a lot of people swim, then it is better to find another place: too many infections are transmitted from person to person through close contact, when it is warm and wet around. Do not swallow water when swimming.

The sand on the beach is not treated with disinfectants, therefore, at a depth of 5–6 centimeters, it is the most favorable environment for various microorganisms (mainly pathogens of fungal infections). Wet sand is especially dangerous.

Mikhail Lebedev

Do not build castles and bury yourself in the sand up to your head if there are wounds on your skin.

After bathing, take a shower if available on the beach, and if not, wash your hands, face and feet. No clean water? Bring wet wipes and bottled liquid antiseptics with you. And you will take a shower when you get to him.

Either way, take off your wet swimsuits and swimming trunks, and change into dry ones while you rest between swims.

How to understand that you can not swim

When you see telltale signs near a river or pond, don't swim there.

• Bathing prohibited sign. Once it is forbidden, then let it be forbidden.
• A flock of ducks or geese. Where waterfowl (especially wild birds) constantly hang out, parasites live in the water.
• A waterhole. The place of the watering hole is easy to identify by the cloud of footprints and the remains of animal life. Here, with a high probability, you can get a set of intestinal infections.
• Driftwood sticking out from under the water. Since something is sticking out of the water, it means that there is something in the water. Consider driftwood as icebergs: invisible thickets hide under the water. This means that there is a high risk of injury, hitting or catching clothes on a twig.
• Garbage dumps. Spontaneous landfills and gutters release a variety of rubbish into the water, not just bacteria and parasites. It is a bad idea to breathe in toxic fumes or swim in a solution of unknown chemical compounds.

Remember that city fountains, in which water circulates in a closed system, from which animals drink and where homeless people wash, is a very, very bad place to swim.