If you’ve ever had to deal with an infestation of lice, you know that these parasites really like to get in there. A horrifying new video reveals the mad acrobatic chops that enable lice to make your hair their home, flinging themselves from strand to strand with the greatest of ease.
A new case study in The New England Journal of Medicine tells a torrid tale of an unnamed 65-year-old man who showed up at a dermatology clinic complaining of an itchy crotch. On examination, the man didn’t appear to have a rash or any lesions, so the doctors investigated his pubic area with a hand-held dermoscope.
The first bit of evidence they uncovered was a nit firmly implanted on a pubic hair. And then came the culprit itself—a freakishly agile, crab-shaped parasite moving from hair to hair like it was nobody’s business.
For the dermatologists, it was a classic case of pubic pediculosis—also known as “crabs.” This happens when the pubic louse, Pthirus pubis, infests a person’s hairy nether regions.
“Pubic pediculosis is usually sexually transmitted but can occur after contact with fomites [materials that are likely to carry infection] such as clothing, bedding, and towels used by an infected person,” write the researchers, who work out of Mexico City’s General Hospital. “The condition most commonly affects teenagers and young adults. This patient reported that he had had no recent sexual contact, and no other sexually transmitted infections were identified on screening.”
The doctors prescribed the oral drug ivermectin, and after two weeks the itching was gone. Which is all fine and well—but what about the psychological scars?