AIBU to report neighbours for typhoid

[Cinders29]

Hi,

So long story our neighbours moved in about 2 years ago. They're extremely messy - huge pond and trampoline and god knows what in the front, back garden has rabbits, dogs and about 50 chickens. Food everywhere , loads of outbuildings and isn't 'stuff everywhere' anyway - no real problem to us ( apart from when we tried to sell our house )

However, we've noticed over the last couple of years an increase in rats ( we live near fields so expected but they're encouraging them ) there are 1000s of what I believe to be rat holes into his garden from the field next door. Weve also seen cockroaches.

Anyway, my son became very poorly a few weeks ago and was admitted to hospital for 4 days. Turns out he had typhoid which is ridiculous in this county right? Anyway with him being at home etc I just don't know where on Earth this could have come from.

Google says it comes from cockroaches - does anyone the likelihood of this please ? Also - if we suspect should we report ? I'll be so angry if it's come from there but I don't wanna just go around accusing when it could possibly have come from somewhere else

[Ozgirl75]

Don’t worry about cockroaches - we get them pretty regularly here in Australia but we don’t have many more tropical diseases than in the U.K, certainly not typhoid!

[Magic2020]

@Ginandplatonic I apologise, doctors do make the initial judgement, and send it to us for confirmation, but I'm trying to counter the popular opinion (as seen on most TV hospital shows) that doctors then take the sample somewhere, look down a microscope in a back room somewhere and declare "ah, typhoid!".

We also often get a whole raft of tests from doctors that think it may be typhoid and may be something else, so without us doing all those tests you wouldn't know for sure it was typhoid as the symptoms are fairly general - fever, maybe diarrhoea but could be constipation, been traveling in an endemic area, or had contact with someone who had been told by their labs that they had typhoid.

Often when we isolate typhoid the doctor hasn't mentioned that as a potential diagnosis anywhere on the form, so we've handled this sample (which should be in CL3) all over our CL2 lab.

[TheTrollFairy]

I don’t think the Op is coming back!

[highmarkingsnowbile]

I don’t think the Op is coming back!

Probably off Googling diseases.

[Cinders29]

Apologies for delay - MN was showing I hadn't posted the thread. Couldn't find it anywhere!

Anyway, yes environment health and public health England have been on the phone with extensive questionnaires. When my son was poorly and I took him to a&e I also took a stool sample that they tested. Luckily we were put in an isolation room due to him being autistic and him diarrhoea they tried to put us on the ward but thank god I insisted otherwise. We left hospital on the Thursday ( 4 days after first arriving ) and on the following Monday or Tuesday they called asking if he was ok - by this point he was and just said he had salmonella. A week later environment health called - also, just said salmonella. The next day public health England called and it was only then that they said salmonella typhi ( because I questioned it )

They went through everywhere we'd had takeaways ( one during lockdown - dominoes which all the family ate from ) and everywhere we'd got our shopping from etc.

I can assure you we are an extremely hygienic family and even more so with all this going on. When we go for walks the kids aren't allowed to touch anything and I take hand sanitizer and wash their hands thoroughly when we come home so I doubt it's been caught on walks ( plus my son very rarely goes for walks anyway as it's near on impossible to get him to leave the house )

I didn't see a cockroach in our neighbours garden there was one in our garden running down the fence that splits the gardens up. I assumed it had come from them because of the mess and rentokil who we've recently had out has said that because they run along surfaces they cause cross contamination however we have put down detectors in the garden and our home and our home and haven't had anything - thankfully. It's also possible on further investigation it may have been another insect that looked very much like a cockroach.

At this point I'm just baffled as to how he could have got it. So have had questions about the neighbours as I was told by rentokil it's a possibility. They've been round and they've glanced over next door. They are from another country and so maybe it's also possible it's come back with them as their relative came to stay with them a week before lockdown.

As other posters have said - no you
Do not get vaccinated from typhoid unless going abroad to a country where there is a risk.

I guess we'll probably never find out the cause but just wanted to see if people thought I would be unreasonable reporting next door. Public health England said they would not be reporting neighbours or investigating it - I would need to do that myself.

[Cinders29]

The other thing is - any food he's eaten we've ate too. I can't think of one thing he's eaten other than things like crisps etc that he's eaten that we haven't. So I dunno if that rules out food or whether or not we've just been lucky.

[highmarkingsnowbile]

Salmonella is a notifiable organism. They wanted to put a patient with diarrhoea of unknown origin in a ward?

[highmarkingsnowbile]

And left notifying neighbours to you? I picked up typhoid from abroad but they definitely determined this was the case.

[CtrlU]

Report them.

[Cinders29]

Yup - obviously at this point no one would have thought it was that. We were actually put on the covid ward and he was tested for that.

I'm worrying now cus he didn't even have antibiotics ( only IV to rehydrate him ) and I've read that he can still be carrying it and have a relapse or still be able
To infect other people. He has medical issues anyway so I'm going to be calling the doctors tomorrow to insist on another stool sample and possibly antibiotics. We have a 3 year old too.

[Cinders29]

CtrlU - the neighbours you mean?

[MissJaneLockland]

They are from another country and so maybe it's also possible it's come back with them

Even if it did come back with them from another country I still don't get how your Ds caught it from them? Unless they have cooked him dinner or touched him in any way? And wouldn't they have symptoms if they had Typhoid themselves?

I think you are blaming the wrong people tbh.

[CoachBombay]

Apologies all, I had diptheria and typhoid mixed up 😳

[Cinders29]

That's fair - and maybe I am blaming the wrong people but I'm just really trying to figure out where this has come from and if we're looking into poor hygiene - that stands out ( and as I said rentokil said that cockroaches can run across surfaces and spread disease including typhoid ) it could well be from food we've ate but the more I think about it - it's only one of those two things.

[Ponoka7]

So he could have contracted it at the start of March? Has he been on a residential? Was he still in school at that point?

The school of tropical diseases and the department of infectious diseases, as well as public health, will want to get to the bottom of it. They are always quite excited when they see anything like this in the UK.

[Cinders29]

His last day of school was the 14th of March ( I took him out a week before due to his health issue )

I'm not sure on incubation - public health England only asked me about the 2 weeks before

[highmarkingsnowbile]

Yes, they would, Ponoka. I was the star patient . Was he not in source isolation? He should have been in source isolation, one of the double-doored rooms with a yellow signs taped on them notifying everyone coming in that you have an infectious disease. I had to use the toilet with one of those paper bowl things under the toilet seat or lining the commode or bedpan (I was really ill for a while) and each one had to be weighed on a scale in the bathroom (he should not have been using a communal bathroom at all!) and taken off by the staff, even pee! And no IV rehydration? I must have had enough blood taken off me to feed Dracula for a week. What's his follow up like?

I think you've been treated disgracefully! You can definitely pick up that disease using the toilet with someone who's infected. He should be followed up, too. Have you all been tested? My poor flatmates all had to be tested and were freaking out, 'She's got TYPHOID!' One of the history students got quite excited, apparently Prince Albert died from typhoid. Joy.

I'd be ringing the GP and not taking no for an answer.

[highmarkingsnowbile]

None of them got it, but I also had my own bathroom in there and didn't use the kitchen once I got back (They were all a load of thieving, slovenly gits and so I had a wee fridge in my room and use a camp stove to cook (with the window open)). They didn't tell you how to scour out your house? I had to hire a professional cleaner, a crime scene cleaner, to clean our place out. It's astonishing how lax they are about this! They went into overdrive once they found out I had typhoid.

Surely one of the first things they asked was have you been abroad and if so, where? They even informed the airline about it and I guess they had to tell all the passengers, I don't know. I was 19, it was about 30 years ago.

[highmarkingsnowbile]

My folks couldn't even come in to visit me in source isolation, and my dad had had typhoid once in Asia. They could just come to the window. And they put him a covid ward?! OMG. I'd be ringing a solicitor after ringing the GP!

[highmarkingsnowbile]

Gah, they were almost gleeful. The doctor and two other people all kitted up came in, 'You have typhoid!'

[MeninSuits]

had to use the toilet with one of those paper bowl things under the toilet seat or lining the commode or bedpan (I was really ill for a while) and each one had to be weighed on a scale in the bathroom (he should not have been using a communal bathroom at all!) and taken off by the staff, even pee! And no IV rehydration? I must have had enough blood taken off me to feed Dracula for a week

Similar to me . Central feeding line and multiple blood transfusions.

[highmarkingsnowbile]

Yep! It was HORRIBLE! Those cramps. I wasn't even allowed to wear underwear, not even the paper ones. I found out the hard way that IVs don't last very long, especially when they have Y-connectors in them to give you drugs. Oh, joy! 'This one has poor venous return, you'll need another.' And when you're all dehydrated and sick, it SUCKED! I had pads under me because sometimes I didn't make it to the call bell for a bedpan or to get on the commode. They treated those the same way, weighing them and treating them like the hazardous waste they were.

I'm stunned at his treatment.

[HowManyNameChangesNow]

Are yoy in the UK?

[highmarkingsnowbile]

It's lucky it appears he got off lightly, too, I was shitting blood.

[highmarkingsnowbile]

Central feeding line

Oh, yes, the TPN, the bag all covered up. It has to have its own line. It can get really problematic. When my daughter was in with cancer and had peritonitis and typhilitis, one of the lumens on her double-lumen Hickman had to be used for the TPN. So that left the other and then canulas for the rest. Total nightmare when someone's on ketamine and morphine for pain relief as well.