Pubic lice is spread commonly by intimate contact, although it also can be spread by using the clothes, bedding, or towels of an infected person (Frey 2002).
Lice infections are known as pediculosis and includes infections of the skin, hair, or genital region caused by lice living directly on the body or on clothing (Frey 2002).
Pubic lice are 1 to 2 millimeters (0.04 to 0.08 inches) in size, varying according to the stage of their development.
Lice feed on skin (epidermal) debris, feather parts, sebaceous secretions, and blood.
Louse (plural: Lice) is any of the small, wingless, dorsoventally flattened insects comprising the neopteran order Phthiraptera.
Lice attach their eggs to their host's hair with specialized saliva that results in a bond that is very difficult to separate without specialized products.
The order has traditionally been divided into two suborders; the sucking lice (Anoplura) and chewing lice (Mallophaga).
Historically, the lice have been divided into two main groups, the sucking lice of the suborder Anoplura and the chewing lice of the order Mallophaga.
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Complications of body lice infestations are headache, fever, and bacterial infection, and body lice can spread systemic typhus and other infections.
Poor personal hygiene or wearing the same clothing repeatedly without laundering is associated with infestation of body lice, and the lice can spread by shared bedding or personal contact (Frey 2002).
Three of the sucking lice of the suborder Anoplura are well-known external parasites on humans: Head lice (Pediculosis humanus capitis), body lice (Pediculosis humanus corporis), and pubic lice (Phthirus pubis).
Usually pubic lice appears on the pubic hair, although it can spread elsewhere, and can appear on the eyelashes of a child born to infected mothers (Frey 2002).
Body lice (Pediculosis humanus corporis) is similar in size to head lice, but are rarely seen on the human skin because they only come to the skin to feed (Frey 2002).
Humans are unique in that they host three different kinds of lice: Pediculosis humanus capitis (head lice), Pediculosis humanus corporis (body lice, which live mainly in clothing), and Phthirus pubis (pubic lice).
The DNA differences between head lice and body lice provide corroborating evidence that humans started wearing clothes at approximately 70,000 B.C.E.
Complications of body lice infestations are headache, fever, and bacterial infection, and body lice can spread systemic typhus and other infections.
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No hair is immune to head lice. There is a misconception that African American hair, because it is coarse, is resistant to head lice. Lice do not care whether hair is smooth or coarse, thin or thick. Lice affix themselves to a strand of hair as a way to get up to the scalp to access their food supply: human blood.