The Remarkable Recovery Of A Flesh-Eating Bacteria Victim
Aimee Copeland wasn’t expected to survive the bacteria that invaded her system after a brutal zip-line fall. But after spending four months in recovery, she’s finally home.
This is Aimee Copeland, a 24-year-old psychology graduate student at the University of West Georgia.
On May 1, Copeland fell from a broken zip-line. She suffered a deep cut to her right leg, which was invaded by a rare, flesh-eating bacterial infection called necrotizing fasciitis.
Copeland’s father kept a blog of her recovery progress; at first, she wasn’t expected to survive. Her left leg, right foot and both hands were amputated, and large patches of skin had to be replaced with skin grafts.
For a while, Copeland resisted pain medications out of personal beliefs. But the pain became so intolerable she eventually accepted them.
On July 2, Copeland was released from the hospital and went to rehab. On Aug. 22, she was finally able to go home.
She’s spent the last two weeks greeting friends and supporters and appearing on Katie to share her story of recovery.
“I love life. It’s a beautiful thing… even more so now,” Copeland told host Katie Couric. “Everything smells better. Everything is more vibrant, more beautiful.”
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Web Sta 8 months agoI wish Copeland well(!). But, FWIW, flesh-eating bacteria are almost entirely found only in hospitals. Not on zip lines or wherever, as Copeland’s doctors have suggested in the past. I have read in story after story covering this topic where the doctors tell those who are stricken with necrotizing fasciitis that they “have no idea where the infection came from.” Which is an utterly ridiculous claim, because this bacteria exists almost exclusively in hospitals, so the source of infection is obvious. It’s this sort of denial of responsibility that leads to “medical error” being (only) the fifth highest cause of death in the U.S. Medical errors often don’t show up on lists of common causes of death — heart disease, infection, stroke, injury, medical “error,” etc. — because when death occurs, to avoid lawsuits, they rarely admit, “I gave the patient an incorrect medication dose that caused a stroke.” In general, the medical industry instead reports only “stroke” on the death certificates. Regardless, even with those ass-covering policies in place, at least 50-100,000 people deaths each year in the U.S. are caused by health care professionals. Which (again, FWIW) is the thing that really bothers me about the new healthcare plan. The healthcare industry is largely designed to cover their asses and keep themselves for being sued, while making the most money they possibly can — about a third of the entire nation’s GDP, while medically, we’re still in Dark Ages, shooting at houseflies with shotguns.
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2themaxe 8 months agoWow what courage, what vastness of life we live in and around but yet gave her a moving edge to recover and to smile like never before..and they say women cant fight in a battle, they say women cant do certain things because of who they are..ha! I give you a prime example of what women can do, i give you a picture of how deep an dark times can be, yet she keeps chugging wow so inspiring. Hah and im a gay man, what do i care about women besides best friends? Lol ..so inspiring
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spencerseamusw 8 months agoJust for the record, and I know no one cares about such a distinction, but necrotizing fasciitis is the name of the medical condition, not the bacteria itself. Multiple distinct bacteria have been implicated in necrotizing fasciitis.
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Alanna Okun 8 months agoThis is one of my top five worst fears realized. (The flesh-eating bacteria part, not the remarkable recovery.)
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