Its dangerous health implications: infection can lead to renal (kidney) damage and can be fatal.

Who is at risk of infection?
People from any age group are susceptible to infection with E. coli O157:H7. However, children, the elderly, and immuno-compromised individuals are more likely to get infected and develop complications. Residents of rural areas and workers employed at farms and slaughterhouses have greater exposure to E. coli O157:H7 due to possible contact with animal manure. However, large outbreaks have occurred in day care centers and nursing homes, posing risk to people associated with such settings. Consumers of bovine products may also be at a higher risk since most outbreaks reported involved consumption of improperly cooked ground beef.

What are the symptoms and complications?
Illness starts with severe diarrhea and abdominal cramps, often developing into bloody diarrhea. The symptoms usually occur three to four days after exposure. Some people infected by E. coli O157:H7 have no symptoms at all or only mild diarrhea. Complications include the hemolytic uremic syndrome (HUS) which results in destruction of red blood cells and kidney failure. HUS can also affect the nervous system causing seizures and eventually coma. High numbers of white blood cells, fever, anemia, and renal insufficiency are signs for HUS development. Although most people recover from HUS, it can be fatal.

Taken from: Factory Farms & E. coli
This ran in The New York Times on September 21, 2006.

Indeed, this epidemic, which has infected more than 100 people and resulted in at least one death, probably has little do with the folks who grow and package your greens. The detective trail ultimately leads back to a seemingly unrelated food industry - beef and dairy cattle.

First, some basic facts about this usually harmless bacterium: E. coli is abundant in the digestive systems of healthy cattle and humans, and if your potato salad happened to be carrying the average E. coli, the acid in your gut is usually enough to kill it.

But the villain in this outbreak, E. coli O157:H7, is far scarier, at least for humans. Your stomach juices are not strong enough to kill this acid-loving bacterium, which is why it’s more likely than other members of the E. coli family to produce abdominal cramps, diarrhea, fever and, in rare cases, fatal kidney failure.

The United States Department of Agriculture does recognize the threat from these huge lagoons of waste, and so pays 75 percent of the cost for a confinement cattle farmer to make manure pits watertight, either by lining them with concrete or building them above ground. But taxpayers are financing a policy that only treats the symptom, not the disease, and at great expense. There remains only one long-term remedy, and it’s still the simplest one: stop feeding grain to cattle.

California’s spinach industry is now the financial victim of an outbreak it probably did not cause, and meanwhile, thousands of acres of other produce are still downstream from these lakes of E. coli-ridden cattle manure. So give the spinach growers a break, and direct your attention to the people in our agricultural community who just might be able to solve this deadly problem: the beef and dairy farmers.

Nina Planck is the author of Real Food: What to Eat and Why.

We are working on several options legislatively, including one bill that we will be voting on in the Environmental Affairs Committee this week to require all local approvals are met before a CAFO can be constructed.

It is important that concerned citizens such as yourself get your elected officials to advocate on your (and all of your neighbors’) behalf. Good luck!

But even if that legislation were repealed, I doubt nusiance suits would always best answer to CAFO problems. They could be one tool to use, but they can be difficult to try, and move the enforcement burden (and costs) from the state to the citizens.

A real, long-term, regulatory approach to industrial-scale livestock operations probably needs to start with the state to have a meaningful impact.

I must say that Mr. Williams’ comment is critical: how can the legislature put into law that a change from a corn field to an 8,000 hog industrial operation is not a change in use?

The denial of owners’ rights to complain about the noxious activities of their neighbors is a taking of valuable property rights, and it will result in lower property values across this state.