Ireland’s record on combating deadly bacteria is scandalous

WHILE the whole world focuses on the horrific outbreak of a particularly virulent strain of E coli in Germany that has so far claimed 22 victims, there has been very little talk about Ireland’s scandalous history of this bacteria.

In 2009, the latest year for which figures are available, twice as many Irish people got ill from the bug as have been affected in Germany by the latest outbreak. The bacteria common in Ireland, VTEC/STEC O157, is essentially the same type of bug in the German outbreak but a different strain.

For three of the past four years up to 2009 Ireland had the highest incidence of E coli poisoning in the EU — up to seven times more than the EU average.

Even more frightening is that the number of people who developed the potentially fatal HUS — hemolytic-uremic syndrome — almost doubled each year from 2007 to a staggering 11% in 2009 — close to double the normal rate.

But while everyone is still frantically searching for the source of the German outbreak, the Irish know exactly what has caused most of the incidents here.

The Irish Health Protection Surveillance Centre had little trouble fingering the culprits — children visiting farms where they handled farm animals; creches where it was spread among children and babies; and water contaminated in the country’s group water schemes and private wells.

Ireland’s medics and laboratories have become somewhat expert in identifying this bacteria, and unlike in many other countries always test for it and diagnose it very quickly.

Dr Brian O’Connell, who works with the Public Health Laboratory in Cherry Orchard, said Irish labs have a particularly good awareness of the bug and send suspect colonies to Cherry Orchard. They can use their rapid method to detect the bacteria, feed back the information to the doctor or hospital and also into the public health system where the source of the outbreak is investigated and dealt with quickly.

Perhaps this helps explain why there have been no deaths recorded in Ireland among those who developed HUS.

HUS can cause serious, life-threatening complications, including kidney failure, high blood pressure, heart problems, stroke and coma. Even when a person recovers their immune systems are often weak, leaving them open to infections; their kidneys and other organs can be permanently damaged and there is a high risk they can suffer kidney failure in the future.

But getting timely and appropriate treatment improves recovery prospects.

Nine years ago the European Court of Justice condemned Ireland for the amount of E coli in drinking water. Four years later nothing had changed and the European Commission threatened to take them to court again. Most of the contamination comes from animal and human sewage leaking into drinking water supplies without being adequately treated. But a proper regime for septic tanks has not been put in place yet and the European Commission is returning to court to ask that fines be levied on Ireland for failing to protect the health of its citizens.