Leptospirosis is an infectious disease caused by several types of Leptospira bacteria. This bacteria infects humans and animals. It’s classified as a zoonosis because the infection is transmittable to you by a diseased animal. But it’s not believed to be spread person to person.
Zoonosis transmission of leptospirosis is via an infected animal’s urine. Dogs and rats being the most common transmitters.
You come down with leptospirosis through contact with contaminated fresh water, food or soil containing infected urine. Frequent paths of introgression include:
- ingestion
- broken skin lesions
- eyes, nose mouth mucous membranes
And the leptospirosis causing bacteria can be passed in an animal’s urine or live outside a host in favorable environments for a long time.
The symptoms caused by this zoonosis infectious disease can range from flu like symptoms to life threatening. Leptospirosis occurs in two phases, during the first phase your flu like symptoms might consist of:
You may also experience these additional symptoms on top of your flu like symptoms:
- skin rash
- bone pain
- joint aches
- sore throat
- conjunctivitis
- abdominal pain
- abnormal lung sounds
- enlarged lymph glands, spleen, liver
Initial leptospirosis symptoms typically last up to a week. At this juncture in the infectious disease process you’re likely to recover fully.
However, you have a slight chance of enjoying a short period of recovery followed by a much more serious phase. The second stage of leptospirosis, aka Weil’s syndrome, causes milder flu like symptoms. But you’re at risk for the development of some other health complications and symptoms, such as:
- shock
- uveitis
- anemia
- red eyes
- jaundice
- meningitis
- liver failure
- blurry vision
- hypotension
- kidney failure
- red skin spots
- bloody sputum
- severe bleeding
- respiratory distress
- blood vessel damage
- decreased in urine output
- cloudy, yellow to orange eye color
Leptospirosis causes some no symptoms at all, while a rare few will die from this infectious disease. And your symptoms can be so similar to other infections that you won’t even realize you’ve had this zoonosis bacteria infection.
Standard bacteria infection treatment for leptospirosis is antibiotics. Generally, antibiotic treatment during the first few days of your bacterial infection is recommended. However, antibiotic treatment in the later phase is controversial because of the potential for a Herxheimer reaction.
Most recover from leptospirosis, with or without bacterial infection treatment. Death resulting from this infectious disease is usually caused by kidney failure. Yet other health conditions can be a cause, like:
Vaccines are formulated for dogs, swine and cattle, but a vaccination for humans is not available. CDC considers leptospirosis a reemerging zoonotic disease.