Stuff You Should Know - How Flesh-eating Bacteria Work

Episode Date: August 30, 2012

Possibly the most horrifically-named disease anyone could contract, flesh-eating bacteria can lead quickly lead to amputations and death. Learn about how this disease works and how to prevent it in this episode with Chuck and Josh. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Flooring contractors agree. When looking for the best to care for hardwood floors, use Bona Hardwood Floor Cleaner. The residue-free, fast drying solution is specially designed for hardwood floors, delivering the safe and effective clean you trust. Bona Hardwood Floor Cleaner is available at most retailers where floor cleaning products are sold and on Amazon. Also available for your other hard surface floors like Stone, Tile, Laminate, Vinyl, and LVT. For cleaning tips and exclusive offers, visit Bona.com slash Bona Clean. The War on Drugs is the excuse our government uses to get away with absolutely insane stuff. Stuff that'll piss you off. The cops, are they just like looting? Are they just like pillaging? They just have way better names for what they call,

like what we would call a jack move or being robbed. They call civil acid work. Be sure to listen to The War on Drugs on the iHeart radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcasts. Brought to you by the reinvented 2012 Camry. It's ready, are you? Welcome to Stuff You Should Know from HowStuffWorks.com. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark, and with me as always is Charles W. Chuck Bryant. He's giving me the A-OK symbol, so we're all set to go. And we have a bowl full of dinosaurs in front of us. Pants are off. Pants are off. Mics are on. Yes. That should be our motto. All of

our open wounds have been treated according to the step-by-step process included in this article. Yeah. Did you read that sidebar? I did. It's gruesome. Yeah, and you know what? This is like, this kind of thing can strike fear into you when it's in the news, which it has been lately in Georgia and nationwide. But it's rare, and we can't say that enough. True. So don't freak out and don't start slathering yourself with antibacterial gel. True. And to the writer's credit, it is pointed out in this article. It's like 500 cases of this a year. Worldwide, right? I didn't get that either way. Not really. Still, even in the U.S., now in like maybe Andorra, that'd be huge. Yeah, true. But Chuck, after researching this, flushing bacteria scares the tar out of you. The beep!

Out of you. Exactly. Yeah. We can't beep any longer. It's sad. You just did, man. You just found a workaround. Just said beep, so that's not the same thing. Yeah, it's pretty scary because it's silent. The silent killer. It can creep up on you. And in the case of Amy Copeland, who will get too sadly, like she was going to the hospitals for three days before they diagnosed it. Yeah. And by that time, it was too late. Right. Not too too late because she survived, obviously. But yeah, apparently, I was reading an article about her and she's just like tough as nails. They said, like, it's incredible. We're going to have to amputate your leg. And she said, like, let's do this is what she said. She couldn't even talk. She mouthed it. I know. Far braver than me. I would

have been like, let's end this. Right. Exactly. Unplug me. I'm such a wuss. Right. Yeah. I heard now that she's up and about. The first thing she did was take like a half gallon shot of Scotch and punch out a doctor just for fun. All right. So we'll get to her tragic but inspiring story. Okay. I was going to use her as an intro. Oh, go ahead then. All right. So we'll get to it right now. Amy Copeland. She's 24. She's a Georgia lady. And she was on a zipline at a friend's house and fell off. I don't know if the zipline broke or if she let go or whatever. But it was it was a malfunction. It was in a it was over like a raviney creek over some brackish water. Yeah. And in brackish water, actually in all fresh water, there is a bacteria called aeromonas

hydrophilia or a hydrophilia. Yeah. And it's everywhere. Normally, if you ingest a little bit of this, you swat it's through swallowed water. Sure. And it gives you the poops just diarrhea though. That's it. Yeah. The reason why just diarrhea is because you have whole colonies of bacteria and antibodies in your stomach that are designed specifically to take on a hydrophilia. Right. And put the smack down on it. Yeah. Part of your immune system. Right. Thankfully. The thing is with Amy Copeland, she had a gash in her leg from when she fell. Yeah. And the bacteria got in that way. And that is a whole different host of problems. Exactly. Your body is not used to fending off bacteria through wounds. Yeah. And there are certain types of bacteria, which are

generally known as flesh eating bacteria that basically mounts the largest, most vicious, virulent campaign of any bacteria around in your human body. This is what I didn't quite get though, because you did this part as additional research, which I appreciate. But I'm not quite sure. Is it a dummy attack is going on? You want to get into this? This is how flesh eating bacteria works. Yeah. I mean, we might as well go ahead and tackle this, and then we'll finish up Amy's story and get into it. Okay. So what happens? What happens is the bacteria, which is, again, a hydrophilia, it's everywhere. Yeah. And our bodies are used to it. Right. Strep. The same group A strep. Strep to caucus A. Yeah. That's what gives us strep throat. Sure. It's everywhere.

15 to 30% of people are carriers, right? These things are everywhere. And normally, when they get into our body through normal channels, our body knows how to ward it off. When they come in through a wound, you have potentially big trouble. And these bacteria are capable of producing toxins. There's enterotoxins, which are cytotoxins, meaning like they directly go and like kill cells, they like weaken the membrane or something like that. So they can go and attack tissues. And then another thing that they might express genetically is exotoxins. Right. These are the ones where if you if you have a bacteria that expresses exotoxins, that's good, right? No, I thought that prompts the immune response.

It does. The problem is, is these bacteria are are prompt are setting off almost, it seems like purposefully, right, an immune response from your T cells. Oh, okay. But it's too big. And this huge response comes about. And it's like this big, lumbering, clumsy response from your T cells. So your T cells are going haywire, because this basically dummy attack has been launched by this bacteria to distract the T cells. So this is what I don't get. Are they are the T cells attacking the wrong thing? The T cells aren't attacking anything. The T cells going on high alert signal the production of cytokines, which are like signals. They're like triggers like histamines are they're an immune response trigger cytokines are the cytokines in

turn overproduce or overexcite macrophages. And those things go and like eat cell detritus or detritus. Actually, I've listened to the pronunciation. It's actually detritus. Okay. So it's cell detritus. Yeah. So they're going haywire. And then last but not least, they promote the release of free radicals, which normally go and target bacteria. But in this huge undirected immune response over response, bacteria has purposefully triggered the free radicals are attacking on this tissue. So you have cytotoxic enterotoxins that the bacteria is producing directly. Yeah. And then it's also indirectly affecting this healthy tissue by promoting the release of free radicals. It does seem purposeful. It very much like it sits around and reads the

art of war. Besides, this is how I'm going to take you down. Exactly. And it works like a charm. So you have your tissue that's being destroyed, right? Yeah, which is where you get the the term necrotizing fascitis, which is the the correct term for flesh eating bacteria. That's right. And you it also promotes something called toxic shock syndrome. Is that when your organs start shutting down? That's part of it. Wow. Yeah. All right. Well, that makes sense. And that's scary. And the scariest part of all this is that it starts out by something really tiny, like it can be a pinprick, right, of an open wound. It doesn't have to be some big gash on your leg. And it starts out as something small and turns into something big, right, which is really scary.

And, you know, if you if you have a cut on your hand or on your leg and you've actually even if you haven't been in any kind of brackish water, if you just if it starts to hurt a lot worse than you think it should, then it's probably not one of the 500 cases, but you should probably start looking into it. Well, what was surprising to me was it doesn't even have to be a cut man. It can be an abrasion, a bruise. Yeah, how could a bruise? I don't get that. I don't know if your skin is thinned out at that site. Really? Like so thin it can just get through the the outer dermis? Maybe. Wow. But yeah, you can and it doesn't just have to be like you said, brackish water, like if you have a cut and open wound on your finger and you're around somebody with strep

throat, you could conceivably, all the stuff is in place for you to contract necrotizing fascitis. And it can go person to person for sure, but without an open wound, it's pretty unlikely. Right. Like that's how they get in. Yeah. And they eat the fat, they eat the tissue, and then they start to consume your organs. Right. And the reason the flesh eating bacteria is clinically the clinical term is necrotizing fascitis, which means the killing of fascia. Right. Fascia is like this membrane that acts as connecting tissue between your skin and fatty layer and your muscles and joints and tendons and ligaments and bones and organs. Yeah. And it's this uninterrupted membrane that covers your entire body beneath your skin. It's like

one of those, what are they called? The one guy sent it to us. We have a green screen one. Oh, the root suit. Yeah, the body suit. It's like a root suit. Yeah. But it's between your skin and your muscles. Right. This is where this infection takes place. And since it's uninterrupted, it can go everywhere. It just basically chugs along and separates your skin from your muscles by killing all the tissue around it. Well, and the other scary part is it's really, really, really fast. Yeah. Like this football player from the University of Tulsa died in a week. Yeah. Big, healthy, tight end. You know, like you don't have to be weak and you don't have to be old or a child. Like it can attack anyone that gets it and take you out pretty quickly. Yeah.

And just a matter of days, like you said, it can go from a pinprick to, you know, you just lost your leg. Yeah. Well, which is what happened with Amy Copeland. I mean, it's a miracle that she's alive right now. Yeah. But she ended up having her left leg completely amputated, her right foot, both of her hands and part of her torso. And she got out of the hospital and like, I mean, it took a while, but then I think two or three days later, she was already had taught herself how to eat. This company has thrown in to build like a 30, $40,000 addition to her home for like rehabilitation and stuff. And yeah, pretty amazing. Like her, her spirit, her dad has been posting like crazy on like Facebook and on her website.

They started and she's a bad man. Majama way better than me. She's tough. Yeah. Yeah. Very inspiring. The war on drugs is the excuse our government uses to get away with absolutely insane stuff. Stuff that will piss you off. The property is guilty. Exactly. And it starts as guilty. It starts as guilty. The cops, are they just like looting? Are they just like pillaging? They just have way better names for what they call like what we would call a jack move or being robbed. They call civil answer. Be sure to listen to the war on drugs on the iHeart radio app, Apple podcast or wherever you get your podcast. I'm Marcel Swiley, that dude and host of more to it, a new iHeart original podcast that takes a deep dive into the biggest topics in sports, entertainment

and culture. The journey begins with headline news, which leads to deeper discussions about life lessons that are presented in every story. Each week we tackle subjects and issues beyond the public's perception and narrative to learn more about the stories and about ourselves. Hosted by someone who defied the odds to go from Compton to the Ivy League and then played 10 years as an all pro defense event. This is not your typical sports show with topics ranging from the social ills that surround us all to the character growth that occurs from overcoming adversity. You'll get inspired hearing stories that highlight the growing pains that fuels anyone on a successful journey. You'll leave every episode with a greater understanding that no

matter the story, the person or outcome, there is always more to it. Found on the iHeart radio app, Apple podcast or wherever you find your favorite shows. So let's say if it's also crazy Chuck, it's not just her. There was another dude from Cartersville, Georgia who had another necrotizing fasciitis case and they were actually in the rooms next to one another at one point. They're at I think a burn center in Augusta because this place is one of the few places in Georgia that knows what they're doing with necrotizing fasciitis. And so how do you treat this thing? Well, the first thing you do once it's diagnosed is like huge, huge heavy doses of antibiotics. Yeah. Obviously to try and kill it, but like we're not talking like

pop a pill every six hours. No, like constant trip just basically flooding your body with it and immunoglobin, globin, immunoglobin. Jerry thought that was funny. Yeah, I heard. So they want to remove like any of the dying flesh and try and try and isolate it and remove the bad parts, which is what they were doing with her. And it just spread so quickly, you know, they were like fighting a really uphill battle in her case. I read a case study. Have you seen any pictures of this stuff? No. So I read a case study of this woman who came in and she had it in her arm. And you could just first of all, her arm is swollen. It was like cabbage patched kids arm. Yeah. But then there's like splotches of like purple and splotches of black. Yeah.

And then what's called the squamation, where like the top layer of skin is just peeling off. And all of this had happened to her like over the course of hours. Yeah. And as they were treating it, one of the things that they'll do before amputation is called debridement, where basically they take the limb that's infected or the area that's infected and they just scrape the tissue off. Yeah, I read about that. I saw a picture of it. It's horrific. Yeah, I didn't look at the pictures. And then after that, they have to treat it with skin grafts after it's been after they got all of it, hopefully if they did on her torso. Yeah. Okay. And if they can't get it, then they amputate. Wow. Yeah. It's a pretty serious condition. Yeah. Okay. So what to look

out for? We said if you have like a, a smallish wound that's like disproportionately painful, you should go on high alert. If it becomes like swollen and red and hot, that's a really bad sign. If you get typical things you might associate with bacteria and bacterial infection like diarrhea and fever and chills, nausea and vomiting, that's a really bad sign too, especially if you have just a small cut in your arm. So that nausea, vomiting, all that stuff could be the result of the infection. It could also be the infection leading to toxic shock syndrome, which in and of itself is pretty interesting. Apparently, we've only known about that since 1978. Really? Yeah. Do you remember like associating it with tampons? No. Well, when it first came out, like almost all the case studies

of this toxic shock syndrome, which is like basically your organ, multi organ failure, which is three or more, lowered blood pressure, all this other stuff. All of the cases were of people who were using like high absorbency tampons. They were women, then they started to look more and more and they realized that that didn't hold true when you looked at more of the case studies there are a lot of men and everything. And now they realize that it's the result of an infection. So like the lower blood pressure is like your body mounting this huge immune defense. So histamines are released, so your blood vessels dilate, so your blood pressure decreases to a really dangerous level. It's basically your body having this enormous allergic

reaction to an infection. And it had nothing to do with tampons? No, it did. It still did, but they thought it was just tampons that triggered toxic shock. Wow. Yeah, even still, there's like warnings on boxes. I think they say like toxic shock syndrome warning. Geez, that's pretty scary. I had older sisters. I did too, but I didn't get in their business. So in the first 24 hours, you know, you're going to feel these pains. The second 20, I'm sorry, three to four days in, there's going to be some swelling. And that's when you might get this purpley rash or like blisters that are filled with a dark fluid that's not a good sign at all. And your skin, even at that point, even three to four days in,

might start to flake off and turn white or dark. And that is definitely a bad sign. That's the disquamation. Then four to five days in, that's when the toxic shock happens. And you're pretty lucky if you haven't been treated at this point to make it out alive. All right. Toxic shock alone, 50% of cases are fatal with um, flesh eating bacteria overall 30 to 40. I saw 25 is the lowest 25 to 40% of cases are fatal. So should we talk about wound care? Sure. I've never cleaned a wound like this. Well, then you haven't been cleaning your wounds correctly. This is one of the ways to prevent flesh eating bacteria.

That's right. You want to flush your wound with cold water initially, no soap. And in fact, you don't even want to get soap into the wound, apparently. You want to clean around it with soap and the cloth and then get some alcohol and put it on your tweezers. Use the tweezers to clean out any gunk that's in there. In the wound site. Yeah. I've never stuck tweezers in one of my cuts ever. Well, that means you didn't have anything in there or you didn't. You didn't know it. I didn't. I was like, I'm not putting tweezers in there. Then you want to apply a bandage. If it's a place that can be exposed to dirt and they say to ask a doctor whether or not to bandage because sometimes wounds are better unbandaged and

heal quicker. Sometimes they're better bandaged and then the old antibiotic appointment. We'll always do you right. Don't forget the, well, yeah. I almost always put a bandaid on. I've never had a wound where I'm like, oh, I probably shouldn't put a bandaid on it. Symbolic bandaid. What else you got? Oh, I've got some other stuff like risk factors. You can be totally healthy just from the badness of Amy Copeland. I assume she's probably a healthy person. Yeah. I think a lot of people typically are healthy. So you can still come down with flesh eating bacteria, necrotizing fasciitis as a healthy person. But there are some risk factors that would put you in the higher likelihood camp. If you've had an infection recently,

especially one with a rash like chicken pox, that's one. Cuts, abrasions, those are big ones. Steroid use, you don't want to be using steroids anyway. But even if they were prescribed. Yeah, there's a lot of steroids, medications that are good. I think steroids prevent cuts from healing as fast. So I think those two combined make you at a higher risk. If your immune system is lower. Sure. If you've just been sick, maybe. Yeah. Diabetes is a big one. Oh, yeah. Yeah. And then if you are a black tar heroin user, there have been outbreaks of necrotizing fasciitis among heroin users before. There was one in the late 90s in San Francisco. Really? And black tar in particular set you up for it because it's like this lower purity heroin

that's gummy. It's gummier than regular heroin. So it collapses your veins like almost immediately. So people who shoot black tar heroin do what's called skin popping, where they shoot it just under the skin or into their muscles. And then because it's not the least bit refined, that's why it's gummy. There's often impurities and sometimes some of those impurities are clostridia, which is a kind of bacteria that can be a flesh eating bacteria. So basically, if you're shooting black tar heroin, you're running the risk of directly injecting flesh eating bacteria. And there's people have lost arms, shoulders, ribs to flesh eating bacteria by shooting black tar heroin. I think the stuff you should know advice is to not do heroin. Let's just go ahead

and just throw that out there. Sure. I could get behind that. You're avoiding a whole host of problems if you don't do heroin. Yep. The H. So what else can you do to prevent it? Well, keep the wounds clean. Wash your hands a lot. And that means warm water and soap and like 15 to 20 seconds of good scrubbing, like you're going into surgery, get between the fingers, dry it off really well. And then after you dry it off, don't go and put your hand back on the faucet to turn it off in a public bathroom or even your own bathroom. Although I don't know if I would do that in my own home. No, I think your own home is okay. Yeah. I feel like there should be some sort of, I mean, it could lead to a rise in superbugs, but we already faced

those. So what do we have to lose? But I feel like there should be more cleaning products handy in like public bathrooms. Well, there are increasingly you see those little hand sanitizer machines. No, I mean, like, here's a bottle of like bleach water and just go ahead and spray that toilet seat or well, I'm not like a Howard Hughes type, but I definitely, after I wash my hands in the bathroom in public, like I don't put my hand on the door handle or anything like that, always try and muscle my way out or put a paper towel between me and the thing. I'm extremely conscious of that too, especially at the gym. Yeah, I've been more conscious about it, which pops up with your character in an episode in our TV show that's

coming out. That's right. A little teaser. Yeah, big teaser right there. That's true. You got anything else? No, I mean, Amy Copeland story has been prominent lately, obviously, and they are accepting donations. And I think we would be remiss if we didn't announce that. She spells her name A-I-M-E-E. So it's A-I-M-E-E-C-O-P-E-L-A-N-D dot com slash donations. And just go to the website anyway and just her story is on there and her progress is on there. It's both frightening and inspiring in her case. So it's definitely, I think, that triggered our desire to do this, right? Or did it? Well, yeah. I mean, just not only that, but it seemed that nobody really had a good idea of what a flesh-eating bacteria does.

A bunch of lousy local news reports. Yeah. And I mean, not even local, like the national stuff too is like, you know, really misinformed. Like they're like each through your tissue. It doesn't eat through your tissue. Nobody dug into how it really works. It was very frustrating. You know why? Because it's way easier just to scare people with things with non-facts. Right. But this is one of the ones where it was like the more I looked into it, the more scared I became even. Well, people are lazy. Yeah. The war on drugs impacts everyone. Whether or not you take drugs. America's public enemy number one is drug abuse. This podcast is going to show you the truth behind the war on drugs. They told me that I

would be charged for conspiracy to distribute 2200 pounds of marijuana. Yeah. And they can do that without any drugs on the table. Without any drugs. Of course, yes, they can do that. And I'm the prime example. The war on drugs is the excuse our government uses to get away with absolutely insane stuff. Stuff that'll piss you off. The property is guilty. Exactly. And it starts as guilty. It starts as guilty. The cops, are they just like looting? Are they just like pillaging? They just have way better names for what they call like what we would call a jack move or being robbed. They call civil acid. Be sure to listen to the war on drugs on the iHeart radio app, apple podcast or wherever you get

your podcast. I'm Marcel Swiley, that dude and host of more to it, a new iHeart original podcast that takes a deep dive into the biggest topics in sports, entertainment and culture. The journey begins with headline news, which leads to deeper discussions about life lessons that are presented in every story. Each week, we tackle subjects and issues beyond the public's perception and narrative to learn more about the stories and about ourselves, hosted by someone who defied the odds to go from Compton to the Ivy League and then played 10 years as an all pro defense event. This is not your typical sports show with topics ranging from the social ills that surround us all to the character growth that occurs from overcoming adversity. You'll get inspired hearing stories that highlight

the growing pains that fuels anyone on a successful journey. You'll leave every episode with a greater understanding that no matter the story, the person or outcome, there is always more to it. Found on the iHeart radio app, apple podcast or wherever you find your favorite shows. Oh, I've got a little more. So like it wasn't until 1952 that somebody used the term necrotizing fascitis and we really started to understand that it was bacteria or whatever. But we knew about it since the Civil War. Wow, that's crazy. What did they call it though in the Civil War? Well, they used to name it according to the doctor who reported it. It was also based on the area of the body that was infected. So like if you had fournias gangrene, it meant that you had

flesh eating bacteria around your genitals. If you had lube wigs angina, it meant you had flesh eating bacteria around your face or mouth or jaw. Really? Yeah. And then they figured out like, oh, wait, we should classify it by the kind of bacteria and that these are not separate things. Like this is all the same thing. These people just had like a cut around there that this got into. Boy, you're in big trouble back then too. Oh yeah. If you're in big trouble now, imagine back then. Pretty scary. Yeah. Well, the first guy to describe it as a Confederate Civil War surgeon named Joseph Jones. Really? And I'm sure he was like, I can't do anything for you, man. Right. He retired. Yeah. To the country. Yeah. So that's it. Flesh eating bacteria. If you want to learn

more about it, you can type that in flesh hyphen eating bacteria into the search bar at howstuffworks.com and that will bring up listener mail. I am going to call this we love the Irish as always. Josh and Chuck and Jerry, just a short note from an old geezer living in Limerick in Ireland, who is one of your most devoted fans for the last number of years when walking my dogs every Sunday on the mountains of Ireland and Alpine areas. Occasionally, I'm listening to stuff you should know on the iPod. My biggest problem is that I've not been able to source a set of earphones that will suit my border colleagues who is cool, intelligent beats would easily tune into you laid

back Southern dudes. So he wants his dogs to listen. That's nice. I thoroughly enjoy the show in particular, your easy symbiotic style. I've recommended it widely. In particular, I enjoyed the shrunken head show because I used to have one. Nice. How you might ask. My sister worked in Columbia in the 70s and 80s and brought me home the president of a shrunken head. It looked very real. So the first question I asked was, is it real? No, it's not. She said, but added, if you really want a genuine head, I'll bring one next time. Needless to say, I declined. This was a big mistake. Seriously. The original head is still hanging behind the bar of a pub on the west coast of co.clare. Is that County Claire? County Claire. All right. That's what they do in Ireland.

Cio. Cio. And that is from my keys. And then Judy and Glenn are the dogs. He named his dogs Judy and Glenn. It's very nice. It's a nice couple from the 50s. I know. And he's just marching around Ireland, listening to us. Awesome. With the shrunken head around his neck, I guess. Well, keep marching, Glenn and Judy and Mike is the human. Mike the human. Thank you very much for writing in on behalf of all three of you. It's pretty cool. So this one was a Yumi request. If you have a request, we want to hear it. We're always looking for good topic suggestions. You can tweet to us at SYSK podcast. Topical request is less than 140 characters almost every time. Yep. You can join us on facebook.com slash stuff you should know unlimited characters

there. Or you can send us an email to stuffpodcast at discovery.com. For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit howstuffworks.com. Brought to you by the reinvented 2012 Camry. It's ready. Are you? The war on drugs is the excuse our government uses to get away with absolutely insane stuff. Stuff that'll piss you off the cops. Are they just like looting? Are they just like pillaging? They just have way better names for what they call like what we would call a jack move or being robbed. They call civil acid. Be sure to listen to the war on drugs on the iHeart radio app, Apple podcast or wherever you get your podcast. Here's today's fortnight weather report.

iHeartland has been hit by a major blizzard. The snow has turned iHeartland and fortnight into a winter wonderland with new festive games, including a winter themed escape room, a holiday obstacle course, ice skating, hidden holiday gifts and more. Look out for upcoming special events from your favorite artists and podcasters all month along with scavenger hunts and new how fan are you challenges. So embrace the holidays at iHeartland in fortnight. Head to iHeartRadio.com slash iHeartland today.