A 29-year-old Michigan chef died last week after battling a rare fungal disease that devastated his lungs.
Sometime before Thanksgiving, Ian Pritchard contracted blastomycosis, a fungal disease that attacked and wore down his respiratory system.
“They showed us a picture of his lungs and they literally looked like Swiss cheese,” his father, Ron Pritchard, told UpNorthLive in December.
Pritchard was taken off life support Saturday at a Detroit hospital, according to a GoFundMe page that raised nearly $20,000 for his family.
“The blastomycosis fungal infection devastated Ian’s lungs beyond repair,” the page said.
A Michigan chef died last week after contracting a rare fungal-borne illness. Ian Pritchard/Facebook
In people with weakened immune systems, the infection will spread from the lungs to the central nervous system along with the skin and joints, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Research from 2005 found that between 4% and 22% of infected people die from blastomycosis.
People get the disease by breathing spores of the fungus blastomyces, which lives in moist soil and decaying wood and leaves found in the Midwest and South.
“It’s in the air, in the trees, in the wet leaves, in the ground, in the mud, everywhere. All of northern Michigan (in fact, the Midwest) is covered in [blastomyces]”Pritchard warned.
The infection usually develops within two to 15 weeks.
About half of patients will suffer symptoms such as fever, cough, shortness of breath and muscle aches.
Although there is no cure, the disease is treated with antifungal medications such as itraconazole. Pritchard said his son’s medications cost about $7,000 a month.
Ian Pritchard had been hospitalized for weeks. Ian Pritchard/Facebook
Now, the Pritchard family is shocked by their sudden loss.
“He was a good boy. He didn’t get into much trouble, it wasn’t difficult to raise him,” the grieving father added. “People love his food, people love him.”
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Source: vtt.edu.vn