First case of possibly fatal disease reported

A CASE of a potentially fatal disease caused by eating undercooked meat infected with the larvae of a worm was reported in Ireland for the first time last month.

Previously found only in foxes, trichinellosis was diagnosed in a Polish man who presented to A&E at a Dublin Hospital after returning from a trip home to Poland. He had been living in Ireland for the past year, but returned to north-west Poland for a holiday in April 2007.

According to a report in Eurosurveillance — an online journal monitoring communicable diseases — the man had “purchased and consumed lightly-smoked pork sausages” during his visit home. He first consumed some of the sausages at the beginning of May and returned to Ireland a week later.