Aimee Copeland, the 24-year-old Georgia student who has already lost her leg to necrotizing fasciitis, a rare, flesh-eating bacteria, is in critical condition and may also lose her hands and her other foot, according to news reports.
Copeland showed evidence of an infection by the flesh-eating disease days after she went to a doctor for a deep cut she suffered from a homemade zip line fall.
Even though the doctors cleaned and closed the wound, it became infected, the Associated Press reported, most likely from bacteria at the zip line site."I couldn't conceive of what it would be like for my daughter to lose her hands and the only other foot she has, as well, and that appears to be what is going to happen," her father Andy Copeland told ABC affiliate WSB-TV. "The most important thing is my daughter is still alive." The Associated Press reported that the specific bacterium that infected Copeland is called Aeromonas hydrophila. This kind of bacteria usually causes diarrhea (when people swallow water contaminated with it), and cases where the bacteria cause flesh-eating diseases are very rare, the AP reported.
Necrotizing Fasciitis explained:
