The U.S. National Whitewater Center in Charlotte, N.C., where the Olympic trials for U.S. canoers and kayakers were held in April, temporarily suspended aquatic operations after public health officials discovered a rare brain-eating amoeba in the facility's water channels.
An Ohio teen who visited the center earlier this month died of primary amebic meningoencephalitis (PAM), an infection caused by Naegleria Fowleri, an amoeba found in freshwater bodies of water during warm weather. The amoeba is harmless if swallowed, but it can travel up a person's nose to the brain, where it destroys tissue. It is extremely rare — only 133 cases have been reported since 1962, according to the U.