In Warm Summer Chesapeake Waters, a Deadly Pathogen Lies in Wait

"The last thing Rodney Donald was expecting during his family’s vacation on the Chesapeake Bay was to almost lose a leg to an aggressive bacteria growing in the brackish waters.

“I’ve grown up on the bay my whole life, and I’m 66,” said Donald, propped up in a bed at MedStar Washington Hospital Center, his right leg stretched out, swathed in bandages. “I’d never even heard about it.”

Vibrio vulnificus, of the same family as vibrio cholera, is a rapid-spreading flesh-eating bacteria that naturally occurs in saltwater or estuaries, particularly from May to October."

Caelainn Hogan reports for the Washington Post July 26, 2014.