Woman suffered torture for months in a wheelchair - cause was the stroking of a cat on vacation

24-year-old paralyzed after caressing a stray cat

A young woman from Great Britain stroked a stray cat on holiday in Portugal and ended up in a wheelchair. Apparently, the 24-year-old had infected by touching the animal with the bacterium Campylobacter, which meant that she was unable to walk for months.

Bacterial infection put young woman in the wheelchair

Especially in cats, many animal lovers can not help caressing them. This was also the case with Gemma Birch from Southport in northwest England - but then something happened that made her touch only some of the animals. For the 24-year-old, when stroking a stray cat, contracted a bacterial infection that resulted in her landing in a wheelchair.

A young woman has been infected while stroking a cat with Campylobacter bacteria. The infection put the 24-year-old in a wheelchair. (Image: Saklakova / fotolia.com)

Campylobacter bacteria detected in the stool

According to a report in the British newspaper Mirror, 24-year-old Gemma Birch contracted an infection during a holiday in Portugal in 2014, causing her to be temporarily paralyzed from the hips.

According to the blogger, she was in Albufeira, where she met a stray cat she became friends with.

However, the love of animals was her fatal: on the last day of her getaway she had vomit again and again and fainted on the return flight.

Back in the UK, she was taken to the Southport Hospital, where the doctors finally discovered that her stool contained the bacteria Campylobacter.

These germs are usually found mainly in chicken meat.

Symptoms of Campylobacter infection

Campylobacter infections can cause inflammatory bowel disease, which is accompanied by symptoms such as diarrhea, severe abdominal pain and fever.

Also possible are nausea and vomiting, blood in the stool and additional complaints such as headache and body aches, chills or fatigue.

In rare cases, the complication of campylobacteriosis is Guillain-Barré syndrome, a disease of the nervous system. The 24-year-old Englishwoman was one of those rare cases.

Disease attacks the nervous system

According to the newspaper report, Gemma Birch was released from the hospital after one week. But her father quickly brought her back after she had numbness in her legs in the middle of the night.

The doctors diagnosed the patient with Guillain-Barré syndrome - a condition in which the body's own immune system attacks its own nervous system.

As a result, the blogger spent four months in a rehabilitation clinic and only returned to her normal self after 14 months.

"I had to rely on nurses to go to the bathroom and wash myself. I lost control of my bowel and bladder and could not use my arms and hands because they were so weak, "the young woman explained.

She assumes that she has contracted the infection by the cat in Portugal, who may have picked up the germs while rummaging in trash cans.

That this is obvious, among other things, an older study, which has been published in the "Canadian Medical Association Journal".

The researchers reported that four-legged friends can transmit harmful pathogens to humans, for example, by bites and scratches, or even if they lick the animal over the face.

Patient became more careful

Gemma Birch has become more careful after the long ordeal.

"As much as I love her, I could not touch a stray cat right now. I love pet cats and would pet them, "said the 24-year-old.

However, she would also hope that "they have not rummaged in hotel containers".

Their wish is that people value their health while they have it. (Ad)