Violently sick 24 hours after swimming in a river

[CrazyHorse]

21yo DS went kayaking (and I assume swimming) in the river, according to DD (DS isn't up to talking atm, I'll ask him later)

He's now being violently sick, repeatedly, even though there is nothing left to come up. His body, really, really doesn't want what ever is in him to be in him! Does this sound like something caught from the river or just a general sickness bug? Does it make a difference in how I can help hiim? I've asked him only to only have sips of water.

The same thing happened 5 years ago when he swam in a ford which is now well known to be polluted.

Did the sickness come on suddenly, OP, did he go from feeling fine to puking in < 1 hr?

The relatively rapid recovery also suggests norovirus.
Noro has a typical incubation period of 36-60 hours.
Also people who get sick from river water usually had their face in the water (& even swallowed it). Kayakers don't usually put face in water.

Noro could be in the water but usually it's on surfaces in houses, kitchens, bathrooms. Very persistent little virus, takes ages to deactivate on surfaces.

Glad to hear he's feeling much better.

It was the wettest year on record, wasn't it?

@MedSchoolRat - yes the vomiting came on very suddenly. At the time DS was saying he didn't feel ill, but his body was just forcing him to vomit. The 111 person did say it could be norovirous. I have been disinfecting everything as a precaution and masked up while mopping his brow.

He did swallow the water though, when laughing, and did a back flip off a bridge, which he proudly told me about last night.

He's gone out this morning right as rain, asking me which sport I thought I could do in the next Olympics if I started training now. There is NOTHING I could do in the next Olympics, and I've been left wondering what nonsense he's considering, but what ever it is will probably be expensive and dangerous and DH and I will be there to pick up the pieces.

Oh, the press and Environmental Agency are making it up then? You don't get dead rivers and Ecoli to this extent just from overspilling drains, no matter how much it rains.

archery. the answer is archery

You can swim and not swallow the water - I’ve never been sick !

I'm sorry to hear that. You must have been worried sick.

It's really quite scary the risks involved in river based activities.

Aside from the pollution issue, I don’t know how anyone can get over the ick of swimming in murky water. I love swimming but cannot bear the idea of not being able see what I’m swimming with.

Apologies, I haven't read through all the replies, but as soon as I read your post, I thought of Weil's Disease. I know very little about it, other than vomiting is one of the symptoms and several children in Suffolk and Essex have got it after swimming in rivers and ponds. It may be worth a Google, even if just for piece of mind. I hope DS s feeling better soon

I live literally on the mouth of the Avon in Bristol… it’s the biggest industrial area… I’m in no way surprised that there is pollution in that river! I wouldn’t be swimming it it - even if we were allowed! So many parasite and bacterial infections that can be caught and the chemicals from the pollution along with that,.. unless I wanted to lose 3 stone rather quickly… actually….. new weight loss plan??

☹️ That is sad that UK rivers and lakes are that polluted.
I feel lucky to be in a place where most of them are clean, quite a few even clean enough to drink from. I used to have a holiday home where our water came from the lake. We boiled it first just to be on the safe side, though, and nobody ever got sick. Of course, this was in the mountains, deep in the woods with no agriculture for many miles around and this particular lake had no beaver dams, meaning no giardia in the water.
I would miss open water lake or river swimming dreadfully. Swimming in a pool just isn't the same experience.
So I can sort of understand why young people are doing it, heedless of the danger. They want to experience nature, not to be immersed in chlorine.
It sucks that they have to put themselves in danger to have that experience.

All rivers should be safe for swimming!. All of the time!
Don’t blame the innocent people who live away from the sea and want to cool off in inland waters. It’s the water authorities at fault and of course, lack of policing their discharges.
Petition your MP. Make it an issue they must deal with. Let’s get our countryside back .

UK waters thread
https://x.com/LoftusSteve/status/1659637753158545414

Really? Do you also think all jungles should be safe for exploring, all mountains safe for climbing, all deserts safe for crossing? I don’t think you understand what nature is, based on this comment. All rivers should be free of having human shit pumped into them, now that you can petition your mp about.

Agreed - saying all rivers should be safe for swimming is like saying all mud should be safe to eat.

Pollution is bad. That doesn't mean the default state of nature is benign and harmless. There are parasites and bacteria everywhere. Plus many rivers are unsafe for swimming due to currents and so on.

People also want to point the finger at companies rather than their own habits. If we all went vegetarian, stopped using plastic and stopped driving, that would be good for rivers but I don't see pressure groups calling for that.

When is this imaginary time when rivers were squeaky clean? 50 years ago or so, barely any sewage was treated and factories were pumping god knows what into the waterways. You'd have to back to pre medieval times or further to find a time when we didn't put crap in the rivers.

Oh my goodness, I am astounded by your responses.
are you saying we should accept that farmers should be able to run off their waist into the rivers and/ or water companies should be able to expel their sewage into uk rivers?

"When is this imaginary time when rivers were squeaky clean?"

Pre Brexit the UK had steadily improving water standards due to having to meet European water and environmental regulations

I well remember gove waxing lyrical about a green Brexit and leading the world in water standards and look how that turned out.