At least two people have died from a flesh-eating bacteria they contracted from eating raw oysters harvested in Louisiana, underscoring what health authorities say is a notable rise in infections.
An official announced the two fatalities at a Louisiana Oyster Task Force meeting earlier this week, a state health official confirmed. According to local outlet WBRZ, one of the deceased ate the oysters at an in-state restaurant, while the other ate them at a Florida eatery.
The fatalities were cased by Vibrio vulnificus, a type of bacteria that occurs in warm coastal waters and is more common between May and October when water temperatures are higher ― though scientists say climate change is expanding that risk.
Emma Herrock, communications director for the Louisiana Department of Health, told HuffPost that Louisiana has counted 22 cases of Vibrio vulnificus this year, not including the Florida case. All were hospitalized, and a total of four have died.
That’s an alarming increase from the same time period over the past 10 years, which have averaged seven Vibrio vulnificus cases and one death annually, the department warned last month.
It’s possible to contract the bacteria from eating any raw or undercooked seafood from warmer waters, but consuming raw oysters, which feed themselves by filtering seawater, is one of the more significant risk factors. It’s impossible to tell whether an oyster is infected by looking at, smelling or eating one, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention warn.
There’s a bigger risk of contracting the virus when exposing open wounds to seawater. Herrock told HuffPost that those exposures accounted for about 82% of the 22 cases in Louisiana this year.
Vibrio vulnificus infection can result in gastrointestinal illness, wound infection or blood poisoning, health officials said. About one in five people with the infection die, “sometimes within a day or two of becoming ill,” the state warned. Others may require limb amputation or extended hospitalization.
Earlier this month, a Louisiana man recounted his Vibrio vulnificus infection to CNN, saying that a day after he noticed a scratch on his leg while crabbing in the bayou, he woke up to a fever, vomiting and blackening sores spreading across his scratched leg. He immediately sought medical attention ― a decision doctors told him saved his life.
“I was given a 50/50 chance of coming out of the hospital alive,” he said of the moments before he was rushed into an operating room to cut away the infection. He spent three weeks in the hospital.
Climate change is likely making Vibrio vulnificus more common, scientists say. A 2023 study found that warming waters on the U.S. eastern seaboard are likely to result in a doubling of cases by 2041–2060. Another study from last year found that such infections have increased eightfold in the eastern U.S. between 1988 and 2018.
The bacteria is already showing up more in previously unseen places, the 2024 study noted. In summer 2023, there were 12 cases in major population centers of New York and Connecticut ― “regions where infections were virtually nonexistent until recently,” the study’s authors said. The shift correlates with a 27% increase in favorable conditions for Vibrio vulnificus along the northeastern coastline.
Warming waters from climate change are also expanding plankton communities, which serve as excellent “reservoirs” for Vibrio vulnificus, that 2024 study noted.
Bigger, more frequent natural disasters ― another result of climate change ― also appear to help spread the bacteria. In Florida, scientists have observed Vibrio vulnificus outbreaks directly after major storms washed seawaters ashore, the 2024 study shared.
The 2023 study noted that overall annual costs associated with Vibrio vulnificus are estimated at $320 million, making it the most expensive marine pathogen in to treat in the U.S.
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