A Texas man survived a flesh-eating infection he contracted from Hurricane Harvey’s floodwaters after intensive treatment at a Houston hospital.
Many victims of such bacterial illnesses suffer a worse fate. But improved therapies and vaccines might be on the way, if scientists can use some new findings from that same hospital on how some bacteria that cause these infections work.
On August 29, J.R. Atkins kayaked through floodwaters left by Hurricane Harvey to check on his neighbors. When he woke up on Wednesday, he noticed that the swelling he’d seen the day before had begun to spread down his arm. He documented his experience, from an urgent care clinic to the ICU of Houston Methodist’s Sugar Land facility, on Facebook.
