- PDF Version (2.2M) - Print Friendly - Help

Food Focus August 2007

Eat this – it’s good for you

Helen Turner is a contributor to New Zealand newspapers and has written regularly about her travels overseas. To learn that she contracted campylobacteriosis after returning to New Zealand is not a total surprise given the frequency of cases here. It highlights yet again the importance of NZFSA’s Campylobacter strategy, the Domestic Food Review and our efforts to ensure food is safe

My mother took our family’s health seriously. I was an asthmatic in the days before inhalers and there was a period when I ate raw comfrey on a daily basis because it was “good for my asthma”. I have since read that it could be carcinogenic but my mother was confident of its benefits.

Right now I would love to return to the sense of security I had then. In fact I would go so far as to say bring in the Nanny State – just to have confidence that the food I eat will be “good for me”.

You see I have recently been through a frightening experience.

The first diagnosis

This year my summer holiday, an important wedding and a visit from my son from overseas were totally ruined. Instead, I had days of painful stomach cramps and diarrhoea accompanied by flu-like symptoms. After five days I was diagnosed with a foodborne illness caused by Campylobacter and prescribed an antibiotic. I improved slowly and started eating again.

Before my illness I ate normal healthy food cooked to my own high standards. But in the critical 10-day period beforehand I had eaten four times at city cafés. No one else in my family got sick. Sometime during those 10 days I picked up Campylobacter.

It seems that most New Zealanders know about campylobacteriosis. When I told people that I had it, they reacted with: “Oh you poor thing. I had that, or someone close to me did, and it was absolutely dreadful”.

But there was more.

The second diagnosis

It started with a tingling sensation around my neck. Over the next couple of days I felt very lethargic. The tingling took over my whole body – it was sore to touch my skin. Every day I felt worse.

As I lost more feeling in my arms and legs it became a struggle to walk. My voice was weak, I could not see well, I was chronically exhausted.

Eventually I went to the after-hours emergency service and the doctor there picked up on the connection between Campylobacter and Guillain-Barré. After much prodding and testing, there was no clear diagnosis. I was sent home with the warning to come back in a hurry if I started having real trouble breathing.

Two days later I went to my GP and she sent me back to the hospital. This time I was admitted and was given immunoglobulin intravenously. After three days I was sent home to sit out the recovery. I was told Guillain-Barré is self-limiting and I would improve.

The recovery

Guillain-Barré syndrome is a very rare and potentially life-threatening disorder. It meant my immune system, in response to the campylobacteriosis, overreacted and started attacking my peripheral nervous system.

Luckily, four unproductive months later I am nearly fully recovered but a quick glance at the Guillain-Barré support organisations on the Internet make for scary reading. A high percentage of Guillain-Barré cases in New Zealand are associated with Campylobacter.

Reportedly we have a bigger problem here in New Zealand with Campylobacter than comparable OECD countries. And I have to agree. Having lived in London, where I ate out often, and travelled extensively, it wasn’t until I came back to New Zealand that I was struck down.

I am not averse to personal responsibility. I already follow all the widely publicised safe food preparation and storage practices. I make sure my hand-washing hygiene is beyond reproach, and I take particular care whenever chicken is in sight.

As the innocent consumer in this story, buying and eating food now feels to me as dangerous as avoiding a drunk driver on a narrow road. I want some reassurance that I can say as my mother did, “eat this, it will be good for you”.

Each issue our columnist gets to air their personal views on a subject close to them. These views do not necessarily represent those of the New Zealand Food Safety Authority, but are published here to encourage debate on issues of current interest.