Six young men died last year after swimming in lakes or pools infested with a brain-eating amoeba, the CDC reports. The bad blobs -- known as Naegleria fowleri or N. fowleri -- thrive in warm, fresh water all over the world. But the key word here is warm. The amoeba loves heat. In the U.S., it inhabits the relatively hot waters of lakes, hot springs, and poorly maintained pools in Southern or Southwestern states.
How Brain-Eating Amoebas Attack
That food source is the human brain. The CDC doesn't like to call N. fowleri "the brain-eating amoeba," but that's what it does.
"It actually is using the brain for food," Yoder says. "So it is a very tragic situation for the person unfortunate enough to have that happen."
After the amoeba enters the nose, it finds its way to the olfactory nerve. N. fowleri appears to be attracted to nerve cells, so it follows the nerve into the brain. That's when bad things happen.
The amoeba has mouth-shaped structures on its surface called food cups. It's perfectly capable of chewing up brain and blood cells with these food cups, but the blob finds it more efficient to secrete enzymes and proteins that dissolve brain cells so it can suck up the debris with its food cup.
Obviously, this causes a lot of damage. And it happens fast: Victims usually die seven to 10 days after infection, although symptoms may not appear for up to 14 days.
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