A small wound. That was all Staphylococcus aureus needed to get in. The bacterium lives peacefully on the skin of almost all of us, but when you bite your nails and create a tiny cut next to the cuticle, you are giving it a direct way inside.
Doctors call this complicated onychophagia with sepsis: the infection stops being confined to the finger and travels through the bloodstream. At that point, we are no longer talking about an aesthetic nuisance, but about fever, uncontrolled inflammation, and organs that begin to fail if no one detects it in time.
What is disturbing is the disproportion. A nervous, almost automatic habit that millions of people repeat without thinking while watching a series or waiting for the bus can end in a hospital bed. The next time you feel the urge to bite a nail, your body will thank you if you stop.
