This disease is caused by a parasite transmitted by humans through the bite of an insect. In a report published in the pages of PLoS Neglected Tropical Diseases, Chagas disease was dubbed "the new American AIDS."
The report's authors, a group of experts on tropical diseases at Baylor College of Medicine, believe that the spread of the disease in this part of the world is similar to how HIV spread in the beginning.
In the United States, Chagas disease is better known as American trypanosomiasis. Like AIDS, according to scientists, the disease has a long incubation period and is almost impossible to cure.
Chagas disease affects about 8 million people in the Americas, mostly in Bolivia, Mexico, Colombia and Central America. However, more than 300,000 infected people live in the United States. Many of them are immigrants.
The disease can be transmitted from mother to child or through blood transfusions. In about a quarter of cases, an enlarged heart and bowel syndrome eventually develops, which as a result provokes sudden death. And medications only help if you start taking them early.
