Who gets Chagas disease?

Who gets Chagas disease?

Anyone exposed to the feces or urine of an infected kissing bug (triatomine) can develop Chagas disease.

The infection is most common in rural or impoverished continental South America, Mexico and Central America. Most infections still occur in Latin American cities of 21 countries, with very few cases of chronic disease in other countries. Public health efforts have decreased disease transmission and helped eradicate it from some areas of South America and Central America.

Now infected people live with Chagas in other places, as people with Chagas disease have moved throughout the world. Very few local vector (insect bites) transmission cases occur in the United States from southern states bordering Mexico. There are no published cases of local transmission from insect bites outside continental America.

People at highest risk of developing Chagas disease include:

• People born in or living in adobe (mud walls) houses with thatched (straw) roofs in rural South America, Central America and Mexico.
• People who received a blood transfusion before universal blood screening for American trypanosomiasis began. This screening started in 2004 in South America, Central America and Mexico, and in 2007 in the U.S.
• Children born from people infected with American trypanosomiasis.

Most people can be infected for a long time even a lifetime without showing symptoms. But the disease can still affect you, even if you don’t know you have it. Without treatment, serious complications occur in approximately 20% to 30% of cases, including cardiac (heart) damage and digestive (bowels) or neurological (brain) issues.