A University of West Georgia graduate student who lost one limb and will probably lose parts of others to flesh-eating bacteria is mouthing words to her family and showing a "fighting spirit," her father said Friday.
Aimee Copeland is fighting for her life at an Augusta hospital after her left leg and part of her abdomen were removed last week. She contracted the infection after injuring her calf in a zip line accident 10 days ago.
"I would say that she has more commands than questions right now," Andy Copeland told "CNN Newsroom," saying his daughter’s breathing tube was repositioned so her parents could read her lips. "'I can’t talk,' was what she said. And we said, 'We know, honey, you've got a tube down your throat.'
"She said, 'Then take it out.' So her fighting spirit is obviously shining through right now.'
Aimee, 24, contracted the bacteria – Aeromonas hydrophila – during an outing with friends near the Little Tallapoosa River, about 50 miles west of Atlanta, on May 1, her family has said. She fell when a homemade zip line she was using snapped, and she gashed her left calf.
The family has said she sought medical treatment for the wound and received 22 staples to close it, according to CNN affiliate WSB. But on May 4, after she complained of pain for days, a friend took her to an emergency room, and she was diagnosed with necrotizing fasciitis and flown to Augusta for surgery. She went into cardiac arrest after being removed from the operating table, but was resuscitated, CNN affiliate WGCL reported.
Her father wrote in an Internet post Thursday that her hands and remaining foot also will have to be amputated soon, because blood vessels there have died as the disease has spread. He said Friday that Aimee doesn’t yet know about these next amputations.
"There’s no way I would reveal that to her in her current state. I believe that it would just traumatize her further," he said, adding that a psychiatrist at the hospital will tell her when she's able to talk.
Andy Copeland wrote Thursday that Aimee shows no sign of brain damage and that a doctor said her lungs are healing. On Friday, he told CNN the road ahead for Aimee will be difficult.
"It's obvious (that) if you’re missing one limb, it's going to be hard enough. But if you're missing all of your limbs, it’s going to be incredibly difficult," he said. "But I guess I want everybody to know is that she’s not alone. She’s got her family to support her in this, and not just us."
Thousands of people have connected with a Facebook page that the family also is using to update her progress.
"She's got the support of the entire world right now. And that's really what's humbled us greatly in this entire process, just knowing that everybody's looking at Aimee and praying for Aimee and just offering their undying support. For that, we'll be eternally grateful."
Aimee Copeland, of Snellville, Georgia, is a graduate psychology student at the University of West Georgia and was scheduled to complete her master's degree in the fall, school spokeswoman Yolanda Rodriguez said.
On Thursday night, a couple dozen students and faculty members attended a vigil for her in a building that houses the school’s psychology department.
"Despite the fact that medical evidence says she should be dead, she isn't. I think that’s what makes it so precious to so many people, to see how amazing she really is," Chris Aanstoos, a University of West Georgia professor, told WSB on Thursday.
Dr. Buddy Creech, an assistant professor of pediatric infectious diseases at Vanderbilt University, said that Aeromonas hydrophila, found in water and elsewhere in the environment, is one of many bacteria that can cause a flesh-eating process.
"When it gets into those deeper tissues, it has a remarkable ability to destroy the tissues that surround it in sort of this hunt for nutrition," Creech said Friday. "When it does that, those tissues die, and you see the inflammation and the swelling and the destruction that can be very difficult to control."
Creech said Aeromonas hydrophila more commonly affects humans when it is swallowed – resulting in diarrhea. When young children or children with immune problems drink water with the bacteria, "they can get a very significant diarrhea illness from it," he said.
"It’s much more uncommon that we see it in (a case like Copeland's), where we see wounds get infected and the infection runs wild,” Creech said.
© 2012 Cable News Network. Turner Broadcasting System, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
| Advertising practices | Advertise with us | About us | Work for us | Help
As we continue to abuse antibacterials and medications, be ready for more and more cases like this.
This had nothing to do with medication overuse or antibiotic resistance bacteria.
@Doug Just because it is not directly mentioned in this article that anti bacterials and antibiotics are related to this, I promise you that it is all intertwined. Try to see the big picture, antibacterial handsoaps and other various anti-bacterials are the biggest scam on the planet. Most bacteria is actually good for humans to make contact with, and the more we try to fight it the stronger ALL strains become. That is fact, not fiction.
Unbelievable....poor little thing. I just prayed for her
God bless her and her family!
It just goes to show you how uncertain life is.
Aimee, you're beautiful no matter what this bug does. Keep fighting, and stay with us! You'll be alright!
Ok, I'm going to say it, the only reason why CNN is putting this article on hear is so we have sympathy for white people, I mean I can't believe this is front page news ... end sarcasm (response to the people getting outraged becase CNN did an article on a black kid with cancer) ... now that I'm done with the sarcasm, I hope her a speedy recovery and well wishes to the family.
meant here not hear
Ya had me going there for a sec, Franky.
Does everything have to be a race or politics? It can't just be a story about a tragic accident without people making it into something else.
I have never heard of this bateria before. Truly scary and sounds like something out of horror film...but obviously not.
can we eat the rest of her body???
Seriously...? Flesh-eating bacteria from a zip line... Really?.... .... .. .I don't think so...
Read the article nimrod,.. the zip line broke, she fell, ashed her leg, probably in a forest (duh, that's where the Zip lines are usually) where the bacteria was residing, likely on a rock, bush, etc.
Great compassion. Move to the back of the line
Read the story again
You are right, It was from the river water she feel in when the line broke. Fresh water bodies can be a dangerous place for open wounds,
No, not from the zip line. From the bacteria in the water she fell in when she cut her leg after falling when the zip line snapped.
Oh this is just an awful thing to happen. I can only offer my prayers to her and her family..I am not so sure I would even want to live if I lost all my limbs, I just don't think I would have the courage. She is very strong. God speed to you all.
That's some terrible luck. Most people who get hurt just heal up, and she gets a rare flesh-eating bacteria. Modern medicine is expensive for this reason – a hundred years ago, this would have killed her, and nobody would have ever understood why. Now she has a fighting chance. I hope insurance will cover what will surely be a massive medical bill; what the bacteria doesn't take, the bill collectors will.
This is a tragic story, but I kind of hope whatever she would prefer is what she gets (death or life). If it were me, life without my hands (I could probably live without feet if I had to) would be too much.
her gentala looks like it would be especially good to knaw on!!!
God Bless You Aimee.
save me the labia!!!
you are unfunny, LD
I am a survivor of flesh eating disease. I lost the back half of my leg three years ago. I apparently contracted the
infection in the hospital. I had my pacemaker replaced 6 weeks before any symptons showed up. I had what I thought
was the flu. I went to my doctor who took blood work and ordered a chest xray and sent us home. When we walked
in the door the phone was ringing., It was the doctor's office saying to get me to the hospital immedicately. My
husband thought that I died on the way to the hospital. They told us that if I had been 2 hours later getting to
the hospital I would have been dead. That night they took me to surgery and told my daughter that I had a 1 in
100 chance of getting off the table alive. I endured 8 more surgerys and was in the hospital 65 days. The doctor
told me that the infection spreads so fast he could actually stand and watch it spread. Thank God for the
wonderful surgeon and infectious disease doctors! Without them I would not be here right now! My thoughts and
prayers go out to your daughter and her family. My family wishes there would have been someone who had been
thru this to talk to. She is strong and sounds like a fighter!!!! God bless you all!!!
I hope you are doing well but your story doesn't make sense.Why would a doctor send someone home who appears to have a serious infection?You said you thought you were going to die on the way to the hospital,but yet you were going home after the doctor's visit?So if the doctor didn't call you to go to the hospital immediately you would have stayed home instead of realizing something was terribly wrong on your own?
Correction. Your husband thought that you died on the way to the hospital.Still sounds like you should've went right to the hospital instead of a doctor's office visit and then home.