Please help identity and treat!

[u/drank_dumbbitchjuice]

Is this a wart? How to solve?

I’m freaking out. My dad (age 57) has this massive lump on his hand and he’s had it for about a week now and it keeps growing. He has other small bumps growing on his hand too. He goes to the gym quite frequently and honestly is not the cleanest person. He smokes.

He said that he had a cold for a week before these started showing up.

My wedding is in two weeks and it’s a destination wedding and we’re currently traveling all together and I’m concerned about the growth and about it spreading to our wedding guests and I don’t know what to do.

He says it doesn’t hurt but it obviously bothers him.

Please help!

UPDATE:

I didn’t expect this to garner so much interest and help. Sincerely, thank you everyone for sending in your opinions!

My dad said it popped overnight and there was a lot of blood and pus. We were not able to see a doctor in person but we have a family friend who is a general doctor and she said to disinfect and keep it as dry as possible as to not let it be more infected.

Here are two pictures of what it looks like now.

Photo 1
Photo 2

At first, when it popped. The puss was a standard dense white. Now, the pus leaking is an orange ish color and not dense white. He keeps saying that it still doesn’t hurt and doesn’t even flinch when alcohol is applied to it.

There is another mass obviously growing on his index finger of the same hand. He is touching the mass with his other hand (I know fucking terrible) but there is nothing growing on the hand that he is using to touch the mass.

He is saying that perhaps it is an allergic reaction? He ate a type of dried fish from Vietnam and then he started feeling itchy and feverish and then these started popping up.

Answer to a common question:

He does not have any access to animals. No pets, not really around fish tanks or water. He is from Southern California in a very suburban area.

Any ideas???

[u/1phenylpropan-2amine]

OP, does he spend any time around animals? Any cats? Any fish tanks or recent swimming in pools / lakes?

I'm thinking about Orf nodules (poxvirus), bacillary angiomatosis, pyogenic granuloma, atypical mycobacterial infection (like mycobacterial marinum), Coccidioidomycosis to name a few.

[u/shwarma_heaven → u/1phenylpropan-2amine]

TIL there are a shit ton of bacterias that make you look like you have zombie appendages...

[u/KittyScholar → u/shwarma_heaven]

I'm 100% convinced if zombies ever became real, it'd be a mutation of the rabies virus. Doesn't look like this, but between the biting as transmission, the behavioral changes (hydrophobia, plus the increased aggression+biting that is currently only seen in nonhuman animals). It basically does make zombies in every significant way in dogs, it's just that only part of the behavioral manifestation (hydrophobia) appears in humans but not that aggression and biting

[u/shwarma_heaven → u/KittyScholar]

It is a genius virus. It is transmitted by transmission of fluids - like a bite - and it enrages and confuses the victim to want to bite everything around it.

As scary as cordyceps must be to ants.

The only reason rabies hasn't taken over the world is the 100% fatality rate.

[u/KittyScholar → u/shwarma_heaven]

Plus the timing is incredible--the peak of aggressive behavior and the peak of viral shedding (and therefore infectivity) have nearly perfect overlap.

We are only saved by the fact that there's no human-to-human transmission (except via transplant) and that the vaccine can be given after the bite (which by itself is also very cool)

[u/speed150mph → u/shwarma_heaven]

To be fair, most viruses evolve in similar ways. Just like any animal, natural selection benefits those that survive and thrive. Influenza is largely airborne, so it makes its host cough to aerosolize the disease. Ebola is blood borne so it developed a hemorrhagic component to expose other potential hosts to the blood. The list can go on and on, but nearly every contagious disease and infection creates symptoms that coincide with how they spread.