BELLINGHAM, Wash. (AP) -- A rare tropical fungus that has infected more than 100 people since it appeared in British Columbia six years ago has crossed the border into Whatcom County, health officials say. Cryptococcus gattii, invisible to the naked eye and found mostly in trees and soil, has infected at least four residents this year, two of them fatally, county health officer Greg Stern said.
Considering how many are exposed to the fungus annually, often in the woods and other outdoor areas, infection remains relatively rare, he and other medical experts said. "I'm concerned about the emergence of a new disease, but it still is relatively rare and that part is reassuring," Stern said. "Even on Vancouver Island and the B.C. mainland, where the assumption would be fairly significant exposure to the spores, very few people get sick."
On the other hand, scientists haven't found a way to reduce the risk of getting the disease, he noted. Cryptococcus gattii is sometimes resistant to medication that is used to treat a more common, related fungus, Cryptococcus neoformans, which typically infects people whose immune systems are impaired.
Courtney Blomeen, 16, of Blaine, the county's fourth known case this year, first thought she had a severely strained shoulder muscle and a chest cold last month, but a computer imaging scan revealed otherwise. "I couldn't breathe, it scared me so much," her father, Greg Blomeen, told The Bellingham Herald. "Her left lung had completely blocked off. There were marble-sized nodules that were showing bright white. It was so bad that the one lung was at collapse."
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