Cholera - help?

[One-Fang]

No, haven't got it.

On a completely different forum somewhere, someone made a comment which I suspect, and I wonder if the more medically-inclined CSers would know some answers.

The comment was "I recently spent five weeks in hospital with cholera". The woman concerned is in a major Canadian city, the post was this year, and also she's pregnant.

1. Wasn't cholera wiped out of the developed world? I can find only suggestions to this effect online, nothing concrete that it Just Doesn't Happen any more in Canada.

2. The treatment for cholera that I could find was "drink water". In very extreme cases you could be hospitalised for an IV drip, but it doesn't say for how long. Five weeks seems an enormous length of time for something for which the treatment is "drink water".

3. Does cholera have an effect on unborn children if the mother does have a bout of it while up the duff? Does how far long she is make a difference? (Apparently due in September, so it would have been very early in the show).

TIA

[Buglady]

She might have been travelling and picked it up. Cholera is by no means gone. It can lead to severe dehydration, which is very dangerous in certain stages of pregnancy.

But 5 weeks seems over the top...

[One-Fang]

Only place she's been lately is Iceland. I'm prepared she might say she travelled. I just would like to know, in advance of asking, in case she says no, whether it's even possible someone in current-day Canada could have it, and that badly.

[One-Fang]

Actually, I just read a bit further and she claims she got it "helping to clean up in Texas after Hurrican Ike". Sounds plausible - you will encounter fecal matter in that sort of environment. But if cholera doesn't already exist fairly rampantly, can you still get it? I thought you had to encounter *infected* fecal matter, not just fecal matter?

[Buglady]

I'm in Canada, and I make a bit of a habit of tracking diseases (I majored in Medieval Studies, became unhealthily obsessed with plagues!)...

Righty-o, I found this:
http://dsol-smed.phac-aspc.gc.ca/dso...es/chol_e.html

Health Canada website says 27 recorded cases in Canada since 1986 (because cholera is very contagious and often fatal, it is a Notifiable Disease - that is, all healthcare staff have a duty to report cases to the Public Health Agency).

"Sporadic cases" recently noted from Louisiana and Texas.

I wonder if she is using "cholera" to describe some other kind of nasty intestinal bug. We have a few of those - Giardiasis and Cryptosporidium infections can be very dangerous for pregnant women, and Giardiasis can hang on for several weeks.

[Buglady]

Actually, I just read a bit further and she claims she got it "helping to clean up in Texas after Hurrican Ike". Sounds plausible - you will encounter fecal matter in that sort of environment. But if cholera doesn't already exist fairly rampantly, can you still get it? I thought you had to encounter *infected* fecal matter, not just fecal matter?

It does have to be infected fecal matter - cholera is a bacterial pathogen. It is entirely possible that she could pick it up in those circumstances - even if there isn't a full blown cholera outbreak, it seems to exist at a low, endemic level in many parts of the world, and a hurricane that wrecked sewage systems would definitely provide a perfect opportunity for the bacteria to spread to new hosts.

Most people who get infected with the bacterium don't get full blown cholera, for some reason - 90% of people get a few days of moderate diarrhea and then they're fine. It's the other 10% that go into massive dehydration, renal failure, circulatory collapse, and death...

[One-Fang]

Wow, so it's entirely possible then? I mean okay, likely that she got it, but five weeks? I think Ike was some time ago wasn't it? So it was before she was preggers, after all. Musta been a really bad case.

It could have been some other random generic intestinal bug, but I suppose if you've been in hospital for five weeks, you generally have a pretty good idea of what with. LOL

[Igorina]

Poking around the CDC (Centers for Disease Control), it looks like there haven't been any reported outbreaks of cholera in the US since the 1800s.

I'm seeing no more than 5 cases per year, and those are usually from people coming back from abroad (usually from third world countries) with it.

If there had been a cholera outbreak after Hurricane Ike, it would have been reported and I can find nothing indicating that. (Did a Google search for it)

Treatment seems to be rehydration with an IV drip in severe cases. In moderate cases, treatment seems to be to just drink clean water to flush the bacterium from the system.

However there can be very severe cases affecting 'about one in 20' that can dehydrate a person rapidly leading to death in a matter of hours.

[Evil Queen]

I live in Houston. There's been absolutely no reports of a Cholera Outbreak down here.

So either she's mistaken, or she's lying. Which do you prefer?

[Greenday]

Yea, as far as drinking water goes, it's just a treatment, not the cure. Cholera extremely dehydrates you and drinking water/IV drips just keep you from dehydrating to the point of death.

[tacohuman]

I live in Houston. There's been absolutely no reports of a Cholera Outbreak down here.

So either she's mistaken, or she's lying. Which do you prefer?

no reports of an outbreak doesn't mean that there still can't be a few isolated incidents. you don't here about outbreaks of bubonic plague in the southwestern u.s., either, but there are still a handful of cases every year.

[Evil Queen]

no reports of an outbreak doesn't mean that there still can't be a few isolated incidents. you don't here about outbreaks of bubonic plague in the southwestern u.s., either, but there are still a handful of cases every year.

I'll have to disagree with this. It's required to inform the public of outbreaks.

Such as the one in New York in 2002.
When the plague killed some monkey in Denver in 2007.

[tacohuman]

I'll have to disagree with this. It's required to inform the public of outbreaks.

Such as the one in New York in 2002.
When the plague killed some monkey in Denver in 2007.

in each of those cases, one infection qualifies as an outbreak, but that isn't always the case. the cdc defines an outbreak as a number of infections greater than that expected in a given community. each of these occurred in cities, and one occurred in the northeast, while most bubonic plague is found in the rural southwest. you don't often hear about the 3 or 4 cases a year from rural arizona or new mexico.

[One-Fang]

Damn, so I'm really no closer. It's looking like probably a fake statement, but there's nothing really concrete on so little information on which to hang her.

Oh well. Thanks for trying. EQ - which do you think I prefer? I suspect foul play here and want to catch her out. Let's just say it's not the only bizarre statement, but one I felt was potentially provable as a lie.