Pasadena woman contracts flesh-eating bacteria.
Grace Brown was on the pier of her Pasadena home last month, as her four grandsons took turns jumping from the dock into Stoney Creek.
The next day, the 76-year-old was rushed by ambulance to Baltimore Washington Medical Center with severe pain coming from a toe on her right foot. Grace and her husband of 58 years, Jack Brown, described her foot as turning dark red with spots that had also turned black and green.
"I was screaming," she said. "I'd never hurt like that before."
After several days at BWMC and later Harbor Hospital in Baltimore where underwent surgery, the grandmother was back at her home on Monday.
Doctors told Brown that she had contracted Vibrio — a flesh eating bacteria that thrives in warm waters. A handful of cases of Vibrio are reported in Anne Arundel each year, the majority of which are borne from water, according to information provided by the county's Department of Health.
In 2014, nine cases of vibrio were reported by the health department. Seven of those were waterborne – with four being associated with the Chesapeake Bay or its tributaries, Elin Jones, a health department spokeswoman, said.
Another two cases were reported as being food related, Jones said.
Jones could not provide the most recent statistics for 2015.
The infection can be transmitted either by water through cuts on the skin or by eating undercooked seafood like oysters, clams or shellfish, said David Rose, the county department's deputy health officer said.
The bacterium grows in local waters during the warmer summer months, Rose said.
http://www.capitalgazette.com/maryland_gazette/news/ph-ac-cn-vibrio-0819-20150818-story.html
