I’m thinking our fisheries biologists. They must have beat up hands, in water for hours, sometimes all day I’d imagine. I don’t think they are getting sick at a higher than normal rate.
Very perceptive! It seems true in my experience. Warmwater and coolwater fish were rough on the hands, with white perch probably being the worst because processing tubs full of hundreds of white perch was like grabbing a pin cushion with the needle points facing outward. Add to that their spiny opercula, just like walleye and yellow perch. Throbbing hands at the end of a trap or gill netting day had so many puncture wounds, mostly superficial, that it wasn’t worth counting.
Striped bass, members of the same family as white perch, were the worst for slash-like cuts and channel cats, although not usually much of a problem, occasionally got us with one of their burning punctures or spine scrapes. All species had their “protective gear” and the most painful and possibly the most threatening for infection, if it were to occur, were crappie and other fish spines going well up under the fingernails or on occasion causing other deeper punctures.
Despite decades of puncture wounds and bleeding cuts of various lengths/depths, aided by water and fish slime softened skin, I only ever got one true infection other than the common, tiny surface pustules, similar to those from an embedded thorn. It was a finger that swelled and required antibiotics. I always immediately squeezed the heck out of any deeper puncture or cut that wasn’t bleeding well to make it bleed more, figuring it would help clean out the wound. But, of course, the hand went right back into the dirty water. Doing a lot of this work in partially treated and raw sewage contaminated water and water receiving substantial amounts of urban, suburban ( think dog and cat feces, etc) and agricultural runoff, I never got a generalized skin infection nor to my knowledge did any of my immediate co-workers.
In my youth I was not the victim of overly protective parents and was allowed/encouraged to be outside ( no encouragement needed), participate in rough and tumble activities, and encounter a full dosage of scrapes, cuts, and dirt, which probably boosted my immune system. Plus it seemed that I was always getting stabbed or cut by small channel cats when fishing for larger ones in the Susquehanna.
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