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The Guardian - AU
The Guardian - AU
National
Natasha May

Australian gardener becomes first person to survive deadly flesh-eating bacteria

Clostridium chauvoei bacterium and pot plant
Doctors believe the Clostridium chauvoei bacterium (left), which usually causes the deadly blackleg disease in cattle and sheep, infected a woman in Sydney when she was repotting her plants. Photograph: Ria Ko/Getty Images

An Australian woman has became the first documented person in the world to survive a pathogen that is usually the cause of the deadly “blackleg” disease in cattle and sheep.

The woman’s doctors this week published the case in the Medical Journal of Australia, detailing the successful treatment of the pathogen, after the only other two known cases in humans – one in the US and the other in Japan – had proved fatal.

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