Unusual bot fly larva removed from the scalp of a returning traveler

Abstract

Abstract An aberrant bot fly specimen was removed from the scalp of a patient 3 wk after returning from Belize. The specimen showed little resemblance to the typical human bot fly larva, Dermatobia hominis, prompting a molecular identification using cytochrome oxidase I and II (COI and COII, respectively) mitochondrial DNA sequence regions. A BLAST search was subsequently performed, and both our COI and COII amplicon sequences showed 99–100% match with Dermatobia hominis, despite the specimen’s clearly aberrant morphology. These findings suggest there is much wider variation in Dermatobia larval morphology than previously known or perhaps that there are new or cryptic species within this group.