Simply put, an amoeba is an organism made up of a single cell. Scientists identified it as “Neegleria fowleri”. ParisInformation taken from The Guardian newspaper.

Invisible to the naked eye, the killer amoeba “first attacks the mucous membrane of the nose before ascending to the brain. The disease it causes, primary amoebic meningoencephalitis, is almost always fatal. It takes about ten days for the victim’s face to cover from the nose to the brain, but the first symptoms usually begin after five days.

Hence the diminutive name “brain-eating” amoeba.

A case in France

In the United States, 154 infections and deaths were attributed to this amoeba. Only one 9-year-old boy died of lightning encephalitis after snorting water while bathing in the hot springs of Guadeloupe.