Everyone's heard the old wives tale- you swallow up to 5 spiders a year while you're sleeping.
While this is blatantly false, and honestly makes no sense when you think about it- I
mean would you willingly crawl into the mouth of a sleeping giant?- other insects aren't
as cautious. Insects like the cockroach, that most hated by mankind of all insectdom. Hello
and welcome to another episode of The Infographics Show- today we're taking a look at the woman
with a cockroach living in her head.
Cockroaches are insidious little creatures. They plague our homes and resist our best
attempts to exterminate them. Yet no matter how bad the infestation, no one ever seriously
thinks that they would be bold enough to make the move inside the human body. But that's
exactly what happened in the city of Injambakkam, India, just this November. One night a 42-
year old woman identified only as Selvi felt an insect crawling around her nostril as she
slept. Brushing the insect away, she was horrified to discover that it had bolted straight up
her nose! Feeling it crawling around inside her nostril, Selvi said that the small cockroach
gave her a burning sensation in her eyes as it crawled around. Unable to sleep- and who
could blame her?- she sat up and waited for dawn so she could go to a nearby clinic.
At the clinic the doctors quickly referred her to a nearby government hospital, where
she had a nasal endoscopy performed to find the intrusive cockroach. Still alive, the
nose spelunking insect had lodged itself in the skull between Selvi's eyes. “This is
the first such case I have seen in my three decades of practice”, remarked Dr. M N Shankar.
The doctors would go on to successfully remove the cockroach, and comment that they were
glad Selvi had not waited to see them as if the cockroach had died she would have developed
an infection which could have spread to the brain. Those doctors probably shouldn't have
worried about Selvi taking her time to see them, as we're pretty sure nobody would hesitate
to immediately head to the hospital if a cockroach ran up their nose.
Selvi's incident was a freak accident as cockroaches don't typically decide to go exploring inside
the human body. Other insects however aren't so careful, or deliberately seek out other
creatures to inhabit or lay their eggs in. If you've got the stomach for it, stay tuned
as we explore more incidents of creepy crawleys ending up inside people.
In July of 2013, for-year-old Paul Franklin was on vacation with his family when he tripped
and skinned his knee at the beach. Kids are notorious for getting bumps and scrapes, so
his family cleaned him up, bandaged him, and didn't think much of it. A few weeks later,
the knee became infected and the family took Paul to the hospital. After a quick inspection,
doctors believed the cause to be nothing more than a staph infection and treated it with
antibiotics. The infection did indeed abate, but a black bump just under the skin continued
to grow. On a hunch, Paul's mom decided to squeeze the bump and out popped a living sea
snail! Turns out that when Paul had scratched up his knee, he must have inadvertently picked
up a fertilized sea snail egg which got stuck in his flesh. Paul took the tiny invader in
stride though and decided to keep it, calling it Turbo after the star of an animated film.
Earlier we mocked the old wive's tale of a spider climbing into your mouth only to be
swallowed, yet our next incident makes us feel that perhaps we were a bit hasty in our
disbelief. Back in 2014 an Australian man named Dylan Maxwell went on holiday to the
Indonesian island of Bali. Enjoying the tropical beaches and lush jungles, Dylan felt what
he thought was an insect bite at the base of a small appendix scar on his navel. Visiting
a local doctor he was prescribed an antihistamine for insect bite and discharged. Upon returning
home however a red scar-like trail started developing from his navel all the way up his
chest, and an alarmed Dylan visited a hospital to be checked out. Doctors were shocked to
discover that a small tropical spider had actually crawled inside of Dylan and made
its way up his body, staying alive for three whole days! Dylan's spider tenant was successfully
removed, and the worst Dylan has to endure now is his friends calling him Spiderman.
Botflies are horrible little creatures who lay their eggs on the exterior of other living
creatures- usually mosquitoes or flies. Upon hatching, the larvae burrow into the host
and start to feed, emerging later to pupate into mature adult botflies. Sometimes a female
botfly will choose a human as a host, and usually the burrowed larva is easily removed
by simply covering the burrow hole with an ointment or other substance that blocks the
larva from breathing.
Usually.
The US Air Force and other military branches routinely engage in humanitarian aid work,
dispatching military doctors and other medical personnel to impoverished areas around the
world. Back in the year 2000, a 5 year old boy reported to an Air Force medical camp
with a swollen eye and complaining of not being able to see out of it. When the military
doctors examined his eye, they were horrified to discover a nearly fully grown botfly larva
attached directly to his eyeball. Under general anesthesia, the doctors made a small incision
into the eyeball and removed a whopping 19 millimeter botfly larva. The boy would go
on to make a full recovery, and after learning of this incident flies may have trumped cockroaches
as our own personal most hated insect in the world. (use images from:https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/get-out-the-mote/)
Our original story features a woman with a cockroach who could have infected her brain,
but our next one shows what happens when insects manage to actually get inside the brain itself.
If you have the stomach for it, keep on watching, and if not we recommend you switch to another
video asap.
Ok, we warned you.
Back in October of 2002 a 70 year old man in the US was involved in a minor car accident.
When police arrived they were shocked at the man's condition. Despite not having suffered
any injuries in the accident, the upper portion of the man's skull and large amounts of his
brain were visible, and the shocked officers immediately contacted paramedics. When taken
to the hospital the man was found to be suffering from an unusual form of cancer which had eaten
away at a portion of his skull and scalp, but because it did not cause him any pain
he had never sought treatment. The exposed brain was discovered to be infested with live
maggots, which had infested the man for an unknown amount of time. Doctors removed the
maggots by suction and with a mild bleach solution, though the man would go on to die
from his untreated cancer three months later.
You might be wondering how the man could possibly be alive after having an exposed brain infested
with live maggots, but turns out that the maggots were probably what was keeping him
alive. As the cancer ate away at the man's skull and scalp, the maggots- which only eat
decaying flesh and leave healthy flesh alone- would have consumed any infected flesh that
might have caused a serious and deadly infection. We have no idea how this man chose to go around
his day with an exposed brain and live maggots living on it, but at least the maggots he
was giving a home to were keeping his gaping wound clean and healthy. In fact, doctors
in developed nations have started using maggots to treat infected wounds, and the treatments
have been found to be far more effective than anything used prior. So next time you go to
the doctor with a bad cut, if it gets infected you might just go home patched up with a few
maggots wriggling around inside you and keeping you healthy!
By the way, if you have the stomach for it go ahead and google this last story, as there
are photos- but be warned, you might not want to eat lunch today if you do.
We sincerely hope you can sleep tonight without feeling an itching, crawling sensation all
over your body- is it just scratchy sheets, or is some insect making its way along your
skin, just looking for a chance to make you its new home? Is that random itch by your
ear just a stray hair, or is a creepy crawly trying to get inside your ear and to your
brain? Is that bump on your stomach just another bug bite, or is something burrowing deeper
inside you, looking to lay its eggs in your flesh? These are all thoughts that we really,
sincerely, hope you avoid after watching our video. Specially tonight, when you're laying
in your bed in the dark. Or maybe next time you go camping.
Have you ever had an insect make its way inside you? How could someone live with maggots crawling
on their exposed brain? Also, be sure to check out our other video The Luckiest Man That
Ever Lived!. Thanks for watching, and as always, don’t forget to like, share and subscribe.
See you next time.