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The 14-year-old
Michael Riley Jr., a junior Olympian and honor student, seemed
to have contracted the disease after he went swimming on Aug. 13
with his track team, his father Mike Riley told KTRK earlier
this week.
"It is with a heavy heart, that we let everyone know that
Michael John Riley Jr. lost his battle on this earth but won a
victory for his place in the arms of our Lord Jesus Christ," the
family said in a statement on their Facebook page late on
Saturday night.
A spokeswoman for Texas Children's Hospital, where Riley had
been listed as a patient, declined to provide information when
reached on Sunday, citing patient confidentiality.
The disease is caused by exposure to a single-celled organism
known as Naegleria fowleri, often referred to as the
brain-eating amoeba.
It is commonly found in warm freshwater such as lakes, rivers
and hot springs, as well as soil. It usually infects people when
contaminated water enters the body through the nose, according
to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Contracting the brain disease is rare, it said.
The organism is most commonly encountered in the southern United
States during the summer, when temperatures are highest, the CDC
said. Of 133 people known to have been infected with it in the
United States since 1962, only three have survived, the CDC
said.
(Reporting by Curtis Skinner in San Francisco; Editing by
Marguerita Choy)
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