Steve Doyle of the Huntsville Times does a great job of giving life to how horrible an E. coli O157:H7 illness can truly be.

Weeks in hospital ‘blur’ after E. coli hit

I urge everyone to read the full article linked above. Some of the points that hit me hardest:

• It began with lunch – Lassiter’s rough time began innocently enough: On June 29, a Friday, she had the chicken fajita wrap combo for lunch at Little Rosie’s Mexican Taqueria on Whitesburg Drive.

• For 76 long days, Lassiter endured a medical nightmare – ventilators, feeding tubes, bleeding kidneys, dialysis, even chemotherapy drugs – as doctors tried to stop the infection.

• She was among 18 Little Rosie’s customers who later tested positive for the dangerous E. coli O157:H7 bacteria. One customer died; three others, including Lassiter and 5-year-old Samuel Coggin of Meridianville, suffered kidney failure and needed dialysis. Public health officials traced the outbreak to shredded lettuce served between June 27 and June 30.