You might want to consider a pair of sandals the next time you take a long stroll on the beach.

After playing barefoot on the sand with his friends, this seven-year-old boy developed itchy raised lines on his left heel.

While they may look like simple scratches, doctors discovered they were actually the outlines of parasitic worms that had burrowed under his skin.

The boy, from Namibia, had gotten the parasites from stepping on feces from an infected dog or cat that were contaminated with larva.

When the boy came into the doctors office, he reported that the lines on his foot got more pronounced as he itched, the case study published in the journal Scientific Research, said.

Doctors ruled out other culprits, finding the boy hadn't been bitten by any bugs or been otherwise injured. He was growing normally and had all of his vaccinations.

But when Doctors asked the boy about his home, they found some clues.

He was from a densely populated area of Rundu, a region in Northeast Namibia, with a population of over 118,000.

Here, doctors discovered the boy had been playing barefoot in the sand with his friends in areas where dogs and cats also relieved themselves.

They therefore diagnosed him with cutaneous larva migrans.

Adult hookworms live in the intestines of infected dogs and cats. When those animals go to their bathroom, sometimes, their feces contains hookworm eggs.

When a human steps on, sits on or touches that soil, the larva can burrow into the skin. They are not mature enough to penetrate into other regions of the body, and stay in the skin, moving as much as a centimeter per day.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-13869157/boys-skin-worms-wriggling-hookworm-Namibia.html