Scabies

Scabies is an intensely pruritic and highly contagious infestation of the skin caused by the mite, Sarcoptes scabiei. It lives its entire life on the human host. A variant is canine scabies, in which humans become infected from pets, mainly dogs. Canine scabies (i.e., mange) causes patchy loss of hair and itching in affected pets. A highly contagious form of scabies, known as Norwegian or crusted scabies, is being increasingly found in individuals who are immunocompromised, aged, physically debilitated or mentally impaired. In this type of infestation, extensive widespread crusted lesions appear with thick hyper– keratotic scales over the elbows, knees, palms and soles. Extensive proliferation occurs in immunocompromised patients. It is readily spread by close contact within families, in institutions and by sexual contact and it has been estimated that the global prevalence of scabies is 300 million cases annually (Walker & Johnstone, 2000).

Although the Sarcoptes mite does not transmit a disease, they are the cause of a diseased condition; scabies spreads in households and neighbourhoods in which there is a high frequency of intimate personal contact or sharing of inanimate objects; and fomite transmission is a major factor in household and nosocomial passage of scabies (Burkhart et al., 2000).