Europe’s E.Coli Outbreak Still Baffling Scientists

Aaron Schachter: I’m Aaron Schachter. This is the world. Europe’s deadly E. coli Outbreak continues to baffle scientists. Authorities in German say more than 1,700 people have fallen ill in that country alone, at least 18 have died. Cases have turned up across Europe and in the U.S., most among people who recently visited Germany. But the source of the infection remains a mystery. Michael Osterholm is an infectious disease expert at the University of Minnesota. Professor Osterholm, the assumption is that the outbreak started with contaminated vegetables. We’re hearing a report today from a lab in Rome suggesting that is not the case. What is going on?


Michael Osterholm: Well first of all there’s a great deal of misinformation out there about what the source is or isn’t based on laboratory testing of produce. As a disease investigator one of the last places we look is actually the laboratory because in mass-produced food, which may be contaminated at a level of only one or two percent of the product actually having the bacteria on it that’s causing the disease, you can test until you’re blue in the face and not find it. So what really is important is doing what we call the epidemiologic studies where you actually look at what did people who got sick eat and what did people who did not get sick eat. Then doing the comparison there and tracing it back from that.

Schachter: So finding the E. coli bacteria is one thing, doing something about it is something else. German doctors are reportedly giving antibiotics to patients. In America we say no antibiotics. Why the discrepancy?

Osterholm: First of all, I think that this outbreak is going to end very soon regardless of what we find or don’t find because if it is indeed a produce item it’s a perishable food item and it’s gone. Second of all, in terms of the people who are currently sick that is a very critical question: What do you do? Our own experience here in the United States where people have developed this very serious complication of infection with kinds of E. Coli bacteria know that one, don’t give patients antibiotics because when you do that actually causes more of the toxin to enter the body as the bacteria die and are lysed open. Our recommendation would be if you have bloody diarrhea do not take an antibiotic at all. Second of all, if you are already sick with HUS, which involves the kidneys and other parts of the circulatory system, there to again you’re not using antibiotics, you’re using other life support mechanisms. We’re hopeful that the German doctors are doing just that.

Schachter: Professor Michael Osterholm heads the Center for Infectious Disease, Research, and Policy at the University of Minnesota. Professor, thank you for joining us.

Osterholm: Thank you.