Officials Investigating Petting Zoo after child’s death from E. coli

Animal barns and a petting zoo at a Maine county fair are currently getting investigated after two kids who made a trip to the fair got infected with E. coli. The even worse news is that one of them has already died.

The US Centers of Disease Control and Prevention’s Maine branch has announced a probe for finding out how exactly the two got infected with the bacterium. Representatives of the CDC currently have their focus on kids’ visits to animal barns and the petting zoo at the Oxford County Fair.

In a recent statement, a CDC spokesperson has said that Maine CDC is right now working with the Department of Agriculture, Conservation and Forestry and State Veterinarian Department for looking at each kid who attended the county fair and visited the petting zoo and animal barns.

Here, it must be mentioned that laboratory tests carried out earlier this week found Shiga toxins, which are known to have links with E. coli. The Oxford County Fair, however, has not yet issued any statement about this incident.

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The county fair at the center of all these ran from September 16 to 19. One kid who got infected with the bacterium was a 20-month old infant named Colton Guay. The toddler developed E. coli symptoms such as severe diarrhea after a week of visiting the fair. Eventually, he had to be hospitalized and later he died at the hospital from a condition called HUS or hemolytic uremic syndrome.

For those who don’t know: HUS is a health complication that is most likely to affect infants infected by E. coli. The disorder occurs when the patient’s red blood cells get destroyed and begin clogging his or her kidneys. Young kids tend to be the ones at maximum risk of developing E. coli infections as they don’t have fully developed immune systems.

Lucy Guay, Colton’s grandmother, informed that as far as their knowledge is concerned the little one never touched any animal, but he did visit the petting zoo. She added that Colton was hospitalized on September 29, and he passed away this Monday.

The CDC has not yet disclosed the condition of the other child infected with E. coli.