Seal finger

Common card · No. 433276

Seal finger, also known as sealer's finger and spekkfinger (from the Norwegian word for "blubber"), is an infection that afflicts the fingers of seal hunters and other people who handle seals, as a result of bites or contact with exposed seal bones; it has also been contracted by exposure to untreated seal pelts. The State of Alaska Section of Epidemiology defines it as "a finger infection associated with bites, cuts, or scratches contaminated by the mouths, blood, or blubber of certain marine mammals". Seal finger was first described scientifically in 1907. It can cause cellulitis, joint inflammation, and swelling of the bone marrow; untreated, the course of "seal finger" is slow and often results in a thickened, contracted joint. Historically, seal finger was treated by amputation of the affected digits once they became unusable. Ariana Bindman, for SFGATE in 2023, reported that "for hundreds of years, fishers long feared contracting" it due to amputation. In the present day, seal finger...

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