FLESH EATING DISEASE DESCRIPTION

Although the term is technically incorrect, flesh-eating disease is an apt descriptor: the infection appears to devour body tissue. Media reports increased in the mid-1990s, but the disease is not new. Hippocrates described it more than three millennia ago and thousands of reports exist from the Civil War.

Flesh-eating disease is divided into two types. Type I is caused by anaerobic bacteria, with or without the presence of aerobic bacteria. Type II, also called hemolytic streptococcal gangrene, is caused by group A streptococci; other bacteria may or may not be present. The disease may also be called synergistic gangrene, among other terms.

The arms and legs are most often affected, but the infection may appear anywhere. For example, Fournier's gangrene is flesh-eating disease in which the infection encompasses the external genitalia.