A 15-year-old girl from Grand Junction, Colorado, is speaking out about the first E. coli symptoms she says she experienced after eating McDonald’s Quarter Pounders.
The popular sandwiches have been linked to an outbreak of the bacteria in 13 states that has left 90 people ill, including one death and 27 hospitalizations, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
The most likely source of outbreak is the slivered onions that come on top of the burger, McDonald’s said in a press release. The distributor of the onions in the affected region, Taylor Farms, said that while no specific ingredient has been confirmed as the source, they’ve “preemptively recalled” yellow onions.
McDonald’s has also stopped sourcing onions from Taylor Farms and pulled Quarter Pounders from the menu at about 900 locations, but the fast-food giant plans to start selling them again this week without onions for the time being.
The girl, Kamberlyn Bowler, is currently in the hospital with kidney failure and gave her first interview about her illness to NBC News.
Teen recalls symptoms that led to hospitalization
Kamberlyn, a previously healthy teenager, went to McDonald’s multiple times in the days before she got sick. She ordered her favorite Quarter Pounder with cheese and extra pickles.
Her first symptoms — fever and stomach pain — started the next month, according to her mother, Brittany Randall.
“(My mom and I) both kind of thought I just had a fever, like just the flu or something — a stomach bug,” Kamberlyn told NBC News. “But then I started throwing up, having diarrhea, and it was bloody, so it scared me.”
Randall took her daughter to the emergency room, but tests didn’t find anything. The teen then started to get worse.
After nearly a week of symptoms, Kamberlyn said she needed to go back to the doctor. “It scared me. I was scared,” she recalled.
At the second doctor visit, tests revealed that Kamberlyn was in kidney failure due to a severe E. coli infection. She was airlifted to Children’s Hospital Colorado in Aurora on Oct. 18 and is still there.
“It’s just been scary to see her body work against her,” Randall said. “It’s been hard. I’ve had to take off time from work, she got on the softball team for her high school, she had to take off the last couple games because she was sick.”
The teen was diagnosed with enterohemorrhagic Escherichia coli-associated hemolytic uremic syndrome (HUS), a rare complication of an E. coli infection caused by the bacteria attacking the kidneys.
Kamberlyn has had multiple rounds of dialysis, and while her kidneys may be able to function again, the extent of the lasting damage is still unknown, according to Randall.
“We’re not really sure what it’s going to look like for her moving forward,” she said. “She’ll probably have to do another round of dialysis. We’re hoping that that’s the last one, but we also don’t know.”
Kamberlyn had no underlying conditions before her E. coli infection. She played softball at her high school.
“She went from being super healthy and no issues at all to possibly kidney damage for her whole life,” said Randall.
In an email, a McDonald’s spokesperson told NBC News that stories like Kamberlyn’s are “devastating to us.”
“We know that people and families have been significantly impacted, and the well-being of our customers is deeply important to us,” the email said.
Lawsuits against the McDonald’s outbreak
Multiple lawsuits have already been filed against McDonald’s over the E. coli Quarter Pounder outbreak. Ron Simon, a lawyer representing Kamberlyn and 32 others affected, told NBC News that he plans to file Kamberlyn’s suit this week. He added that he has received hundreds of calls since the outbreak began.
“It’s going to be a lot more cases in this outbreak than 75,” Simon said.
One of the lawsuits was filed by Clarissa DeBock, 33, a receptionist from North Platte, Nebraska, who says she ate a Quarter Pounder on Sept. 18 and ended up in the emergency room a week later. DeBock is also a client of Simon.
On Oct. 27, McDonald’s President Joe Erlinger apologized to customers in a video, vowing to regain customer’s trust.
“On behalf of the McDonald’s system, I want you to hear from me: We are sorry,” he said. “For those customers affected, you have my commitment that, led by our values, we will make this right.”
E. coli symptoms
According to the CDC, the following are signs of an E. coli infection and could merit contacting a health care provider:
- Diarrhea and a fever higher than 102°F
- Diarrhea for more than three days that is not improving
- Bloody diarrhea
- So much vomiting that you cannot keep liquids down
- Signs of dehydration, such as not peeing much, dry mouth and throat, feeling dizzy when standing up
Symptoms usually start three to four days after consuming the bacteria, and most people typically recover without treatment after five to seven days, according to the CDC.
NBC News’ Christine Romans, Elizabeth Chuck and Laura Allenbaugh contributed reporting.
