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The outbreak continues and the cause is yet to be found! Speculation abounds and accusations are being made forth with, but there has been no basis of fact to substantiate the cause. What is the source, and the origination of this deadly outbreak, as it is spreading beyond the borders of the EU?
The calamity is upon us, and what can we do if we do not know the cause!
An outbreak of killer E. coli that has spread to 12 countries and killed 19 people may be linked to a Hamburg festival in May and could have caused a 20th death.
As authorities continued on Saturday to hunt the source of the killer bug, the Robert Koch Institute (RKI), Germany’s national disease centre, is looking closely at a harbour festival that took place in Hamburg on May 6-8.
Restaurants investigated
Faced with uncertainty over the source of the outbreak, reports said police were investigating a possible deliberate act and were also checking two restaurants in the northern town of Lubeck, one in which 17 diners fell ill and another in which eight women were sickened, one of whom died.
On Thursday Germany authorities said the number of new infections appeared to be stabilising. But Reinhard Brunkhorst, president of the German Nephrology Society, said: “We are dealing here in fact with the biggest epidemic caused by bacteria in recent decades.”
All but one of the fatalities since the outbreak of enterohaemorrhagic E. coli (EHEC) poisoning began last month have occurred in Germany. A patient who died in Sweden had recently returned from Germany.
Regional German health authorities have reported more than 2,000 cases of people falling ill, with symptoms including stomach cramps, diarrhoea, fever and vomiting.
A large majority are female, suggesting the source is “probably something that women prefer more than men”, Andrea Ellis, an epidemiologist at the World Health Organisation’s department of food safety, said in Geneva.
In some cases the infection can lead to bloody diarrhoea and potentially life-threatening conditions such as haemolytic uraemic syndrome (HUS), a kidney disease. At least 552 people, 520 of them in Germany, have HUS, according to the WHO, with 10 other European countries plus the US reporting HUS or EHEC infections.
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It don't Matter! 