Infectious Fungus Common in Household Drains

NPR's health blog Shot reports that "the fungus ... (genus Fusarium) can cause sinus infections and funky toenails. On rare occasions it kills people with weak immune systems. More recently, it has caused serious eye infections in people who wear contact lenses. The types of Fusarium that caused the outbreaks of eye infections in 2005 and 2006 are sometimes found in household plumbing, so researchers at Penn State University set out to see just how common they are. They swabbed 471 bathroom drains in the Eastern U.S. and California, and found that two-thirds of sink drains harbored at least one Fusarium strain." Read more.