An 8-year-old girl in Louisiana has died after being infected by an extremely rare brain-eating amoeba that is found in warm freshwater, her family says.
Lillian Smart died over the weekend after being diagnosed with an infection from Naegleria fowleri, according to a spokesperson for her family. Health authorities describe it as a “brain-eating amoeba” that thrives in freshwater bodies around the U.S. and can shoot up the nose and cause an infection that almost always proves fatal. On average there are fewer than 10 cases annually in the U.S.
The Louisiana Department of Health, in a separate release announcing the case, said Naegleria fowleri ‘grows best’ in extended periods of extreme heat and lower water levels — conditions that have persisted across the Gulf South this summer.
“Last night Lillian ran from our arms to the arms of Jesus,” her parents, Daniel and Rebecca Smart, wrote Sunday in a public post on Facebook. “The injuries to her brain were too severe for her little body to recover from. Everyone did everything they could to keep her here.”
The Louisiana Department of Health said last week that the state had experienced its first confirmed Naegleria fowleri infection since 2013. The department, which did not identify Smart, does not comment on individual cases or specific patients, according to spokesperson Stacey Grow.
“Heartbroken over the news of Lillian’s passing,” Louisiana Gov. Jeff Landry wrote on X.
The infection was likely contracted while swimming in Lake Claiborne in north Louisiana, the Louisiana Department of Health said.
The amoeba can lead to a fatal infection known as primary amoebic meningoencephalitis when water carrying the amoeba travels up the nose and into the brain. Between 1937 and 2025, there have only been approximately 180 confirmed infections in the U.S., according to the Health Department, which added that the cases are “nearly always fatal.” The infection cannot spread from person to person.
Naegleria fowleri is found in warm freshwater lakes, rivers, canals and ponds throughout the U.S. The amoeba becomes dangerous in water that stays over 77 degrees Fahrenheit (25 degrees Celsius) and for years has been seen almost exclusively in the summer in the southern part of the country. A few recent cases have appeared in Maryland, Indiana and Minnesota, scientists said.
“The amoeba is naturally occurring, and there is no routine environmental test for Naegleria fowleri in bodies of water,” the Louisiana Department of Health stated.
Last year, a 12-year-old boy in South Carolina also died from an infection caused by the amoeba.
Additional reporting contributed by Nick Lichtenberg.
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Brook is a corps member for The Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues.