【转帖】E. coli sweeping Europe identified as new strain

应助达人

While the German health ministry has kept up its recommendation not to eat raw lettuce, cucumbers and tomatoes, the director of the Kiel-based hospital for kidney diseases said strict hygiene was the best protection.

Professor Ulrich Kunzendorf, Kiel Hospital Director, said, "It is definitely possible to protect oneself. The most important thing is hygiene. We know that the pathogen are transmitted via the mouth. They must enter the mouth and ten to one hundred pathogen are absolutely sufficient. But it can be said that if hygiene is respected and when people cook meat above 70 degrees Celsius the pathogen are killed off. So people can in fact do a lot in order to protect themselves."

Meanwhile, the World Health Organization said the E.coli bacteria has not been seen in an outbreak before.

More than 1,600 people have been infected by E.coli, with Germany at the center of the outbreak.

E. coli bacteria themselves are harmless. But the strain that is making people sick in Europe has the ability to stick to intestinal walls where it pumps out toxins, sometimes causing severe bloody diarrhea and other complications.