Rare brain-eating amoebas killed woman who rinsed her sinuses with tap water
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Re: Rare brain-eating amoebas killed woman who rinsed her sinuses with tap water
#2Sounds like she was using a neti-pot. I thought most of the neti-pot products made it pretty clear that you're supposed to use previously boiled or distilled bottled water. Maybe they need to make it more clear that the consequences of using tap water can be pretty dangerous.
Re: Rare brain-eating amoebas killed woman who rinsed her sinuses with tap water
#3I wash my nose in such a way frequently because I have an extreme sensitivity to airborne chemicals and fragrances. It’s so uncomfortable to be doused with air freshener, diesel exhaust, cleaner fumes, laundry fragrance, plastic odor or perfume that I rinse my nose out with whatever water is available, which includes taps and drinking fountains. I’ve worried about such an illness happening to me, evidently with good reason.
Re: Rare brain-eating amoebas killed woman who rinsed her sinuses with tap water
#4I had surgery on my sinuses and and have to do this as well. The product I use (Neilmed sinus rinse) has warnings ALL OVER the box, bottle, and in the instruction pamphlet to only use previously boiled water, distilled water, freshly opened bottled water, or water that has somehow otherwise been filtered. It specifically says NOT to use tap water. They also have a website (that has recently been updated to mention this news article, but otherwise has the same information as it had over a year ago when I last checked) telling you not to use tap water: http://www.neilmed.com/usa/np_water_quality.php
Usually I would say that it's unreasonable to expect consumers to read the fine print, but this is a medical product, so at a minimum I would expect everyone using it to read the instruction pamphlet included in the box. It's not just "put water in bottle, squeeze bottle" either, so if you don't read the instructions you'll be very uncomfortable to the point of probably not using it any more (you have to heat the water to a specific temperature and mix in the included salt packets, and the instructions also tell you how to clean the bottle).
I'm sorry for this woman's family, but this is really darwinism (edit: not actually darwinism. I was using that as a figure of speech) at work. It's not even expensive to use distilled water, I get a gallon from walmart for less than a dollar and it lasts me multiple weeks (and I use it twice a day).
Re: Rare brain-eating amoebas killed woman who rinsed her sinuses with tap water
#5Rough.
Re: Rare brain-eating amoebas killed woman who rinsed her sinuses with tap water
#6I wash my nose in such a way frequently because I have an extreme sensitivity to airborne chemicals and fragrances. It’s so uncomfortable to be doused with air freshener, diesel exhaust, cleaner fumes, laundry fragrance, plastic odor or perfume that I rinse my nose out with whatever water is available, which includes taps and drinking fountains. I’ve worried about such an illness happening to me, evidently with good…
Yea, you need to stop that. Start carrying distilled water with you.
Re: Rare brain-eating amoebas killed woman who rinsed her sinuses with tap water
#7Person dies under unusual, rare circumstances. Happens every day, there are nearly 8 billion of us. Why is this news?
Re: Rare brain-eating amoebas killed woman who rinsed her sinuses with tap water
#8I had surgery on my sinuses and and have to do this as well. The product I use (Neilmed sinus rinse) has warnings ALL OVER the box, bottle, and in the instruction pamphlet to only use previously boiled water, distilled water, freshly opened bottled water, or water that has somehow otherwise been filtered. It specifically says NOT to use tap water. They also have a website (that has recently been updated to mention th…
From the article, what's somewhat surprising to me is that she actually used a store-bought water filter:
> In the case of the Seattle woman, she likely became infected with the amoebas from her tap water, according to the researchers. Rather than filling her neti pot with saline or sterile water, she used tap water filtered through a store-bought water filter.
Re: Rare brain-eating amoebas killed woman who rinsed her sinuses with tap water
#9I wash my nose in such a way frequently because I have an extreme sensitivity to airborne chemicals and fragrances. It’s so uncomfortable to be doused with air freshener, diesel exhaust, cleaner fumes, laundry fragrance, plastic odor or perfume that I rinse my nose out with whatever water is available, which includes taps and drinking fountains. I’ve worried about such an illness happening to me, evidently with good…
You can safely use bottled water, that would probably be a easy alternative :)
Re: Rare brain-eating amoebas killed woman who rinsed her sinuses with tap water
#10Ouch. I've taken to using the Arm&Hammer spray cans, even though they're quite a bit more expensive.