The Athens City-County Health Department said Wednesday, Nov. 11, that it is investigating four laboratory-confirmed cases of Shiga toxin-producing E. coli, known as STEC, in Athens County, in an announcement first reported by The Athens Messenger and summarized Nov. 11 by Marler Blog.
Health department staff are working to identify how the infections occurred, whether there is a common source, and whether any risk to the public continues, according to Marler Blog’s summary of the announcement. No source has been identified. The department noted that STEC can spread through contaminated food or water, contact with animals, or contaminated surfaces.
The announcement did not say whether any of the four people are students at Ohio University, which is based in Athens, and it did not release their ages, when they became ill, or whether anyone has been hospitalized, according to Marler Blog. It also did not identify a serotype — whether the infections are E. coli O157:H7 or one of the non-O157 strains — or say whether testing shows the four infections are related to one another.
People who are sick should wait at least 48 hours after their last episode of vomiting or diarrhea before returning to in-person classes, work, or campus and community events, and should not prepare food for others during that time, the health department said, according to Marler Blog. The guidance matters in a college town, where a single sick food worker or student can expose a dining hall or classroom before symptoms are linked together.
Residents should seek emergency care for diarrhea lasting more than two days, blood in the stool or urine, severe abdominal cramps, frequent vomiting, or signs of dehydration, the announcement said, according to Marler Blog. Unusual fatigue, pale skin and easy bruising can be warning signs of hemolytic uremic syndrome, a kidney complication that follows some STEC infections, most often in young children.
STEC is a Class B reportable disease in Ohio, and clinical laboratories send isolates and Shiga toxin-positive specimens to the Ohio Department of Health Laboratory for confirmation and molecular analysis — the testing that will show whether these four cases share a single source, according to Marler Blog’s review of the state’s Infectious Disease Control Manual. Athens County residents with bloody diarrhea or severe stomach cramps can reach the Athens City-County Health Department at 740-592-4431, and health officials advise anyone who is ill to note what they ate and where they went in the week before becoming sick.
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