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"Helge Karch, the director of the RKI's EHEC consulting laboratory at the Münster University Hospital in western Germany, has devoted almost his entire life as a researcher to EHEC bacteria.The bacterium that is currently being experienced in Germany is an enterohemorrhagic strain of the bacterium Escherichia coli (EHEC), a close relative of harmless intestinal bacteria, but one that produces the dangerous Shiga toxin. All it takes is about 100 bacteria -- which isn't much in the world of bacteria, which are normally counted by the millions -- to become infected. After an incubation period of two to 10 days, patients experience watery or bloody diarrhea.
"But I've never encountered something like this," he says.
Comment: From our archives in 2010:
Israeli cabinet's guilt trip to Germany: Merkel 'donates' nuclear submarine to Netanyahu
Israel Stations Nuclear Missile Subs Off Iran