• Question: Are there any diseases which can liquidize the insides of your body? Any which solidify?

    Asked by dizzyg12 to Susan, Simon, Rachel, Lou on 13 Nov 2013.
    • Photo: Simon Langley-Evans

      Simon Langley-Evans answered on 13 Nov 2013:

      Thankfully the answer is no- unless you get bitten by a giant spider! Spiders feed by poisoning their prey and then injecting digestive juices into the body. The prey is liquidized and just sucked out.

      There are infections that humans get which cause the tissues of the body to be eaten away. Necrotizing fasciitis is known as flesh eating disease and involves bacteria infecting the skin and eating away the tissue (nasty).

      Ebola is a horrific deadly disease that some people think has a liquifying effect on the organs of the body. This is because the poor people who get it develop leaky blood vessels and blood is lost from the liver, the gut, nose and mouth. This isn’t what kills them though- death is because all of the main organs fail.

    • Photo: Rachel Dakin

      Rachel Dakin answered on 13 Nov 2013:

      Simon has come up with some pretty interesting diseases there.
      Something I’m interested in is diseases which cause the blood vessels to get thicker and become solid when they aren’t suppose to. This can be because of damage to the vessel wall which then allows fat cells to get in. It can also be because excess calcium gets in. This is called calcification and can stiffen the blood vessels. It is dangerous as it often reduces space for the blood to flow and also means the vessels don’t have the flexibility they require.
      So these aren’t as interesting as flesh eating diseases but still the solidifying of the blood vessels is very dangerous.

    • Photo: Susan Skelton

      Susan Skelton answered on 14 Nov 2013:

      I don’t know of any diseases which can liquidize the insides of your body – that doesn’t sounds very pleasant!
      But I think several diseases have the effect of solidifying parts of your body, like the solidification of blood vessels which Rachel is interested in.
      There are some serious lung diseases which cause the lungs to solidify which stops the patient from being able to breathe – all very nasty.

    • Photo: Louise Brown

      Louise Brown answered on 14 Nov 2013:

      I have only heard of Ebola as Simon mentioned! What a nasty disease. I don’t like to think about that when I’m eating my dinner!

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