Killer cucumbers linked to E. coli cases

FOURTEEN people have died in Germany and hundreds more have fallen ill across Europe, apparently due to consuming cucumbers contaminated with enterohaemorrhagic Escherichia coli (EHEC).

Several hundred people are being treated in hospitals for haemorrhagic colitis or haemolytic uraemic syndrome (HUS) in what the World Health Organization has described as a “very large and very severe” outbreak.

The EHEC, or Shiga-toxin producing bacteria, have affected an unusually high number of adults instead of the normal high-risk groups, which are