What Happened
A 58-year-old woman in Greece appears to hold the record for growing a parasitic sheep bot fly in her nose the longest, almost creating a snot rocket that could literally fly.
Why It Matters
Usually, when the sheep bot fly accidentally nosedives into a human's schnoz, the first-stage larvae they deliver don’t actually develop.
Key Details
- In contrast, in its normal target—a sheep's nose— the larvae would move up into the sinuses, feed, grow, and molt into second- and third-stage larvae.
- From there, the flies (Oestrus ovis) drip from the nose onto the ground, burrow into the soil, pupate, and emerge as adult flies.
- For a long time, experts thought that the flies couldn't complete their development in humans beyond the first larval stage.
- But a few human cases have been reported in recent decades involving the second- and third-stage larvae.
Background Context
A 58-year-old woman in Greece appears to hold the record for growing a parasitic sheep bot fly in her nose the longest, almost creating a snot rocket that could literally fly. Usually, when the sheep bot fly accidentally nosedives into a human's schnoz, the first-stage larvae they deliver don’t actually develop. In contrast, in its normal target—a sheep's nose— the larvae would move up into the sinuses, feed, grow, and molt into second- and third-stage larvae. From there, the flies (Oestrus ovis) drip from the nose onto the ground, burrow into the soil, pupate, and emerge as adult flies. For a long time, experts thought that the flies couldn't complete their development in humans beyond the
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Source: Ars Technica – All content – Original Link
Source: Ars Technica – All content
