On October 25, 1997, Sylvio Barbosa, a 23-year-old Brazilian, was splashing in the Amazon River near his village of Itacoatiara, in central Brazil, when a pressing urge took hold of him. He extracts his penis and begins to urinate peacefully. The powerful jet has only a few centimeters to cross before mixing with the water of the river. Quite to his relief, Sylvio observes, without being suspicious, a small fish, long and whitish, approaching him. The unfortunate ! With a single trigger, the wiggling roach pulls up the stream of urine and rushes into the urethra. Stunned, Sylvio immediately goes to the aid of his organ. It tries to grab the attacker before he gets too engaged. But it slips through his fingers before disappearing inside.
The young man feels the intruder go up in his urethra causing terrible pain. He calls for help from his friends, who don’t know what to do to relieve him. The fish in question is a candiru, a dozen centimeters long. Usually, it enters the gills of fish to attach to the wall and suck blood. Did Sylvio’s attacker mistake the meatus of his penis for a fish’s gill? It’s possible. The candirus have always had this reputation as a surprise guest. If the young man is writhing in pain, his visitor is not at his best either. After its rise in the urethra, here it is blocked by the sphincter controlling urine. Impossible to turn around. Trapped, he dies.
Three days after penetration, Sylvio’s uncle calls the clinic of a renowned urologist, Dr. Anoar Samad. He recalled, “At first I thought it was a joke. In addition to bleeding, the patient could no longer urinate. Having performed a cytoscopy, I was able to identify a candiru. In his scientific publication dedicated to this case, the doctor notes: “The fish occupied the entire anterior urethra near the urinary sphincter, the muscle that controls urine. Apparently, while still alive, the fish attempted to enter the scrotum. We thought about opening the perineum and removing it that way, but we managed to remove it endoscopically. »
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