Salt water Parasites / diseases - Human transferrable

[Treefer32]

Well, after losing 15 fish over the last 3 weeks (which I've posted several threads on). I've evaluated a few things:

1. I know the cause or start to all this death was electricity...
2. Which, I believe stressed the fish making them extremely susceptible to disease and illness. It seems like many of the fish each died of something different. I don't know if a single disease killed them all.
3. My corals continue to grow awesomely as does my algae scrubber..
4. Seeing my foxface with a large obvious gash by his gill and him constantly shaking his head now, reminds me there definitely was something either parasitic or disease that went through the 400 gallons of water even with a UV sterilizer.

So, my question is as I work in the tank with bare hands and sometimes cuts exposed... Is there any danger of human transference of fish diseases and parasites. Seeing what my fox face is going through, is not something I want to ever go through! I don't hear of many people getting sick from swimming in the ocean and there's a lot more parasites, diseases, etc, out there than in our tanks, but, just wanted to confirm that diseases and parasites in our tanks are rarely, if not impossible to transfer outside of salt water or to internal human organs? (Assuming very good hygiene practices... I wash with anti bacterial soap thoroughly any part of me that's ever in the tank afterwards... I never skip that part....). So, aside from a bacterial infection, I've never heard of a human getting Ich, but, I'm also not a biologist.

 

[Spar]

I can site nothing here, but have heard over my 20+ years of aquarium hobby time that the answer is a hard no on human transferal. We are biologically just too different and the diseases/parasites have evolved to attach the specific type of creature.

You still want to wash your hands after putting them in the tank for general health though!

 

[Frtdrmrose7]

I think the biggest threat in a DT for your hands is a mean clownfish!

 

[norfolkgarden]

You can absolutely get certain diseases!
"Fish tuberculosis" is transferable. And a few others I am not smart enough to worry about when I put my hands in the tank all the time.
Your general good health is the main factor in not getting them.

If you are older, immune compromised or (a few younger coworkers, alchohol immune compromised) yeah, you could easily be vulnerable.

This knowledge is one of those phases you can go through in life.
Reading up on what is possible, vector wise, in any and every aspect of your life, will have you wanting to hide in the house for a week. :-/

Any small infection that won't go away in a month should be looked at by a doctor.
Specify you have a salt water fish tank and put your hands in it often enough.
That small mildly annoying infection that never really seems to get worse but never gets better will probably get you more than a months worth of really annoying antibiotics.

People don't exactly die of the majority of this stuff, it's just often a major inconvenience. Like Hepatitis C, lots of people can have it or get it. Long term future damage is a main issue.

Lol, you never heard about Hep C much in the past 4 decades, until they came out with a $40,000 cure. It was just kind of out there and another random possibility for most people.

Go on R2R and Google some of the infection threads.

 

[rkpetersen]

You can absolutely get certain diseases!
"Fish tuberculosis" is transferable. And a few others I am not smart enough to worry about when I put my hands in the tank all the time.
Your general good health is the main factor in not getting them.

If you are older, immune compromised or (a few younger coworkers, alchohol immune compromised) yeah, you could easily be vulnerable.

This knowledge is one of those phases you can go through in life.
Reading up on what is possible, vector wise, in any and every aspect of your life, will have you wanting to hide in the house for a week. :-/

Any small infection that won't go away in a month should be looked at by a doctor.
Specify you have a salt water fish tank and put your hands in it often enough.
That small mildly annoying infection that never really seems to get worse but never gets better will probably get you more than a months worth of really annoying antibiotics.

People don't exactly die of the majority of this stuff, it's just often a major inconvenience. Like Hepatitis C, lots of people can have it or get it. Long term future damage is a main issue.

Lol, you never heard about Hep C much in the past 4 decades, until they came out with a $40,000 cure. It was just kind of out there and another random possibility for most people.

Go on R2R and Google some of the infection threads.

If you have open wounds on your hands, or you touch your wet hands to mucous membranes (eyes, nose, mouth), then it might be possible to transfer some things.
Vibrio organisms are common in the sea and can be quite tough on people in the right circumstances. For example.

 

[Treefer32]

Wow! Crazy! I'm going to go hide in a bubble now! Ha! Good to keep in mind if anything severe hits! I'm almost OCD about purging my hands and arms and not touching things while working in the tank. I picture millions of horrible looking bacteria, pods, and things crawling over my skin... I haven't removed my skin yet... That'll be the next step... ;-)

 

[norfolkgarden]

Wow! Crazy! I'm going to go hide in a bubble now! Ha! Good to keep in mind if anything severe hits! I'm almost OCD about purging my hands and arms and not touching things while working in the tank. I picture millions of horrible looking bacteria, pods, and things crawling over my skin... I haven't removed my skin yet... That'll be the next step... ;-)

Lol, diseases and infections is quite the rabbit hole.

If you read up on it too much you can self diagnose to death. ;- )

Mostly just keep it it the back of your mind and get it checked out, by someone who is up on zoonotics, if something doesn't go away and heal properly like it should.
Otherwise wash your hands a lot and you should be ok.
:- )

 

[rkpetersen]

If you read up on it too much you can self diagnose to death. ;- )

Occupational hazard of physicians, especially young ones still in training.
Most people get a stuffy nose, they think they're coming down with a cold, or allergies.
They're fortunate that they don't know about things like lethal midline granuloma.

 

[TexasTodd]

Vibrio is what I've heard, which is the "flesh eating bacteria" you hear about from warm coastal areas every so often in the news.

Interestingly, I have't heard this exact term Norfolk, but it seems to fit...

alchohol immune compromised

I have a friend who is the head of infectious diseases at a university and he has told me that just about every case of FEB is an alcoholic.