Article Link: http://exchangepress.com/article/ask-dr.-sue-ringworm/5010976/
Ringworm is a common infection that tends to spread in child care settings. The cause is not a worm at all, but a family of fungal infections. Each member of the family is fairly specific for the place on the body it likes to grow.The fungus that grows on the scalp does not grow on the body. The one that grows across broad areas in the very top layers of the skin is different from the one that makes ring-like structures where the skin has only fine body hair. Another type grows between the toes and is the cause of athlete's foot. (This kind seems to need the mature tissue environment of a post-puberty person. Kids get cracking, blistering, and peeling skin rashes on their feet from other causes, but they do not usually get the fungus that causes the condition known as athlete's foot.) Finally, there is the fungus that grows in the moist warm areas around the genitalia, mostly in adolescent and adult males. That one causes a condition commonly called "jock itch."
All the types of fungus that cause these conditions spread by direct contact with an infected person ...