Listen Now: MrBallen’s Medical Mysteries

[00:00:00] Today I have something a little bit different.

[00:00:03] We've all been there, turning to the internet to self-diagnosed and explicable pains,

[00:00:08] sudden fevers and strange rashes.

[00:00:11] Usually it's nothing. But for an unlucky few, these unsuspecting symptoms

[00:00:15] can start the clock ticking on a terrifying medical mystery.

[00:00:20] Each week on MrBallens Medical Mysteries podcast, you can expect bizarre,

[00:00:25] unheard of diseases, miraculous recoveries, strange medical mishaps,

[00:00:29] unexplainable deaths and everything in between.

[00:00:33] Their team has spent countless hours delving into spying, tingling medical mysteries and

[00:00:37] diagnostic horrors that will send shivers down your spine.

[00:00:41] Like the episode Needle in a Haystack, where a little girl falls prey to a disease so deadly

[00:00:47] and rare that the CDC fears it might be an act of bioterrorism.

[00:00:52] Investigators scrambled to find the source as more patients feel victim,

[00:00:55] but the answer came from somewhere no one was expecting.

[00:01:00] With each episode it's become more and more clear that these extraordinary and often terrifying

[00:01:05] stories reveal just how common the uncommon can be.

[00:01:10] I'm about to play you an episode of MrBallens Medical Mysteries,

[00:01:14] and while you're listening be sure to follow MrBallens Medical Mysteries on the

[00:01:31] In August of 2021, a young woman in Georgia stood on the street,

[00:01:35] watching an amazement as people in white hazmat suits,

[00:01:38] carried dozens of items out of her house inside of plastic Ziploc bags.

[00:01:42] It looked like her beloved home was now being used as the set for a science fiction film.

[00:01:48] But the woman knew that the unfolding disaster in front of her was all too real.

[00:01:53] Her daughter had recently become infected by a deadly mysterious bacteria and nobody had any

[00:01:59] deal where it had come from. So not only were this woman and her family at risk,

[00:02:04] but thousands of other people could be too. That's why on this warm summer afternoon,

[00:02:09] officials from the Centers for Disease Control, or CDC for short, were scouring this woman's

[00:02:14] property, gathering samples of soil, plants, food, and other household items for their

[00:02:19] laboratories to analyze. As the woman stood in front of her house out on the road,

[00:02:24] she closed her eyes and prayed that the CDC's search of her home would be successful.

[00:02:28] Something in her house had already nearly killed her daughter, if they couldn't find the source

[00:02:33] of the bacteria, her home would continue to be a danger to the people she loved the most.

[00:02:48] From Ballon Studios and Wondry, I'm Mr. Ballon, and this is Mr. Ballon's medical mysteries.

[00:02:53] Where every week we will explore a new baffling mystery,

[00:02:57] originating from the one place we all can't escape, our own bodies.

[00:03:01] So, if you liked today's story, the next time the follow button is not home,

[00:03:05] release a family of wild raccoons into their attic. The episode is called Needle in Haystack.

[00:03:22] Josie Baker smiled that she watched her four-year-old daughter Lila hunt for frogs near the

[00:03:26] stream behind their house. Josie's other daughter, when your old Adelaide,

[00:03:31] grip her mother's hand as she woupled forward to see what her big sister was up to.

[00:03:35] On this sunny afternoon in late March of 2021, the 24-year-old mother felt like her dreams were

[00:03:41] coming true. Just over a year ago, Josie had moved into this small house in the farmlands

[00:03:48] north of Dallas, Texas with her family. They all loved the fresh air and wide open space,

[00:03:53] and little Lila had become close friends with the cows that grazed in the past year next door.

[00:03:59] Josie shared her daughter's love of animals. She actually worked as a veterinary assistant

[00:04:03] in a local animal hospital, and the family had even taken in a pet raccoon named Jinx.

[00:04:09] Josie checked her watch and realized her husband, Dustin, would be home soon from his job as

[00:04:14] a firefighter and paramedic, and so she needed to start fixing dinner. She called out to Lila

[00:04:19] and scooped up baby Adelaide, then the whole crew headed for the back door of their house.

[00:04:24] But the moment Josie stepped inside the house, she was overwhelmed by a strong floral smell,

[00:04:30] like someone nearby was wearing way too much perfume. Josie held her nose and peaked inside the kitchen,

[00:04:35] and it was a total mess. Cabinet doors were wide open, and it looked like the food inside had been

[00:04:41] hurled across the room, boxes of cereal and bags of chips were ripped open and spilled all over

[00:04:46] the counter and the floor. The cabinet under the kitchen sink was also open and broken bottles

[00:04:51] of dishwashing detergent and other cleaning supplies for spread out all over the place.

[00:04:56] And when Josie looked closely, she saw something else, tiny animal footprints tracking the

[00:05:05] jinx, their raccoon had ransacked it. Jinx was supposed to live in an enclosure in the living room,

[00:05:13] but clearly he escaped and decided to have some fun in the kitchen.

[00:05:17] Josie ultimately found jinx hiding under the bed in Lila's bedroom, and while she was mad,

[00:05:22] she couldn't really stay mad at him as he stared out at her with his little black cute eyes,

[00:05:27] and so Josie coaxed him out with some food before picking him up and returning him to his pen.

[00:05:32] Now she swept up the broken glass in the kitchen, Josie felt like she actually had kind of

[00:05:36] dodged a bullet here, because you know this could have been a whole lot worse if maybe her

[00:05:40] girls had come into the house ahead of her and maybe got cut on all the shards of glass lying

[00:05:44] around. And so as she dumped the trash into a waste basket, she had to admit to herself that

[00:05:50] all in all the whole scene in front of her was actually kind of funny. You know while the house

[00:05:54] may be a total mess and a total pain to clean up, one thing was certain, they're little

[00:05:59] back-oing jinx after breaking into all the cleaning supplies was now the sweetest smelling

[00:06:04] raccoon in the state of Texas. Two weeks later after tucking in the girls for the night,

[00:06:13] Josie walked back out to the living room to snuggle up on the couch with her husband Dustin.

[00:06:18] But when she stepped into the room, she found Dustin standing in the corner, staring into jinx's

[00:06:23] enclosure. Josie was curious and so she walked over to see what he was looking at,

[00:06:27] and when she looked down, she gasped. Jinx was acting so weird. The raccoon swayed and staggered

[00:06:34] as he walked around as enclosure, almost like he was drunk. He also kept bumping into objects and

[00:06:40] walls which made Josie think maybe his vision was impaired. Because of her job as a veterinary

[00:06:44] technician, Josie had been around plenty of sick animals, but Jinx's condition was something

[00:06:50] she'd actually never seen before in any other animal. So she told Dustin that she would bring Jinx

[00:06:55] with her to the animal hospital first thing in the morning. The next morning, Josie stood by

[00:07:03] while one of the vets at her hospital examined her raccoon. But after a few minutes, the vet

[00:07:09] turned Josie and admitted that they too were totally stumped by whatever was bothering jinx

[00:07:14] they didn't understand what it was. Josie agreed that the best course of action now would be

[00:07:19] to keep jinx under observation at the hospital and run some additional tests.

[00:07:24] But over the course of his stay, nothing the veterinarians did seem to help Jinx and in fact,

[00:07:30] Jinx just seemed to get sicker and sicker until he basically just lay in his cage,

[00:07:34] panting with his tongue out. And then two days after he had come to the hospital, Jinx died.

[00:07:41] Josie was devastated, but she was far more concerned about how her daughter Lila would react to

[00:07:46] Jinx's passing. She was going to be absolutely heartbroken. The day after Jinx's death,

[00:07:52] the baker family walked solemnly down the path behind their house towards the stream,

[00:07:57] and they buried Jinx under a tree. At the end of the service, Josie kneeled down and helped

[00:08:02] to very sad Lila plant flowers atop her beloved pet's final resting place. A few weeks later,

[00:08:11] on the afternoon of May 29, Josie sat on her living room couch right next to Lila,

[00:08:16] who for the past couple of days had been vomiting and running a fever. Her pediatrician had said

[00:08:21] it was probably just a stomach flu and recommended rest in fluids. So Josie had pulled together

[00:08:27] all these pillows and blankets and put them on the couch to let her daughter relax and watch

[00:08:31] TV while she recuperated. However, as Josie looked at her sleeping daughter beside her,

[00:08:38] she felt increasingly worried. Josie had been carefully following the doctor's instructions,

[00:08:43] but Lila's fever really hadn't broken yet, and she was still struggling to keep her food down.

[00:08:48] Lila had been sleeping for a couple of hours now, so Josie gently placed her hand on

[00:08:52] Lila's forehead and whispered to her to wake up so she could drink some water.

[00:08:57] But as Lila slowly opened her eyes, Josie could see that they looked glazed over and unfocused.

[00:09:03] Josie tried to help Lila sit up, but the little girl could barely lift her head.

[00:09:08] Josie immediately wrapped her daughter in a blanket and carried her to the car. Her barely

[00:09:12] conscious four-year-old needed to see a doctor right away. Later that day, Josie climbed out of

[00:09:22] an ambulance outside of the Children's Hospital in Dallas, Texas, while orderlies ran to help

[00:09:27] unload Lila from the back. The doctor at their local hospital where Josie had gone first

[00:09:32] had told Josie that based on her daughter's condition, you know, this local hospital could not

[00:09:38] help her. They needed specialized care. So Lila had been rushed in an ambulance to a major

[00:09:44] pediatric hospital instead. Once Lila was unloaded from the ambulance, she was immediately

[00:09:49] taken up to the intensive care unit. At the same time, a doctor named Katherine Merrill met

[00:09:55] with Josie in the hallway to explain what they were going to do to treat her daughter.

[00:09:59] Dr. Merrill said that Lila's white blood cell count was very high, which was a strong

[00:10:03] indicator that Lila was fighting off an infection. Josie listened carefully as the doctor laid

[00:10:09] out the range of tests they planned to run to try to figure out where this infection came from

[00:10:14] and where it was located in Lila's body. Dr. Merrill also explained that while the testing

[00:10:20] was in progress, they would also be administering antibiotics to Lila to help her fight off

[00:10:25] whatever this infection was. As they talked, Josie could hear her daughter throwing up again,

[00:10:31] so Josie quickly thanked the doctor and rushed back to her daughter's bedside.

[00:10:39] Over the next couple of days, the doctors and nurses in medical team ran dozens of tests on

[00:10:44] but unfortunately the results of those tests didn't really tell them anything.

[00:10:50] All the tests could confirm was that whatever was going on with Lila was not one of the

[00:10:54] common suspects like bacterial meningitis or a foodborne disease like Salmonella.

[00:11:00] And as each test came back basically showing nothing, Dr. Merrill became more and more confused.

[00:11:08] Meanwhile, Lila's condition grew even worse. Her frequent vomiting caused her to have trouble

[00:11:13] which led to low oxygen levels in her blood. So Dr. Merrill decided to insert a breathing tube

[00:11:19] through Lila's nose and down her windpipe, requiring the little girl to be heavily sedated.

[00:11:25] Lila's illness consumed the entire family as first Josie and then Dustin took leave from their

[00:11:31] jobs so they could spend more time at the hospital with their girl.

[00:11:35] But day after day, no new information came in and Lila kept getting worse.

[00:11:40] Not only was she completely incapable of holding her head up now, she couldn't even walk or speak.

[00:11:46] And so it wasn't long before Josie and Dustin began to fear the worst but they might never

[00:11:50] get their sweet energetic four-year-old back. One night in June, nearly two weeks after Lila got sick,

[00:12:01] Dr. Merrill entered Lila's hospital room and found her parents at her bedside as usual.

[00:12:07] After giving Lila an extensive examination, Dr. Merrill thought that this infection was actually

[00:12:11] attacking Lila's brain and nervous system. In order to find out for sure,

[00:12:17] Lila's doctors would perform a brain biopsy which meant they would cut a small opening

[00:12:22] and Lila's skull to acquire tiny samples of her brain tissue. Josie thought that sounded like

[00:12:28] a very intense operation for such a young girl in such a weakened state already but the brain

[00:12:33] biopsy was also their best remaining hope to find out what was going on with her.

[00:12:37] So Josie and Dustin looked at each other for a moment and it was clear they both understood

[00:12:42] they didn't really have a choice here. They had to do this so they told Dr. Merrill

[00:12:47] to go ahead with the procedure. A few days later, Josie sat by Lila's hospital bed

[00:12:59] and read to her from her favorite book while Dustin napped nearby in a chair.

[00:13:04] Lila was still not able to speak or walk but she had made it through the brain biopsie just

[00:13:08] fine and was actually starting to show small signs of improvement. And so Josie was actually

[00:13:13] optimistic for the first time in a while. But moments later, Dr. Merrill entered

[00:13:20] and pulled up a chair to speak with the parents. The results had come back from the brain biopsy

[00:13:25] and there was finally an answer to what was telling their daughter. But the answer was not a good one.

[00:13:31] Dr. Merrill said that Lila was suffering from a rare and potentially deadly bacterial infection

[00:13:37] known as Melioidosis. The doctor explained that once this bacteria invades a person's system,

[00:13:44] it causes pus-filled abscesses in whatever tissue it reaches, which is why nearly 40% of Melioidosis

[00:13:51] patients die. And in Lila's case, the bacteria had entered her brain and nervous system,

[00:13:57] which was why she was having so much trouble moving and speaking, and seemed very disoriented.

[00:14:03] All of this was obviously totally devastating to Josie and Dustin, but the doctor told

[00:14:09] the very upset parents that there actually was reason for hope. Now that they actually knew

[00:14:14] which bacteria was making their daughter sick, they could give her the right antibiotics to help Lila

[00:14:19] try to defeat the infection once and for all. Two weeks after Lila's brain biopsy, a woman in

[00:14:29] her 20s named Julia Petrus arrived at the Centers for Disease Control or CDC for short in Atlanta,

[00:14:35] Georgia, for her first day as an epidemic intelligence officer. For years, Julia had worked as a nurse,

[00:14:43] providing health services to refugees in Bangladesh and Uganda. More recently, she provided

[00:14:48] medical care for homeless people in Santa Barbara, California, in the early stages of the COVID pandemic.

[00:14:54] And now she was excited to take on a new challenge. As an epidemic intelligence officer,

[00:14:59] Julia was now basically a disease detective, who would investigate mysterious outbreaks and do

[00:15:06] her best to prevent the spread of infections. As Julia sat down at her desk and checked her email

[00:15:12] inbox for the first time, she could see that she was already invited to a Zoom meeting that was

[00:15:16] starting in just a few minutes. CDC officials would be briefing the FBI about a recent outbreak

[00:15:23] of Melioidosis, a very rare bacterial infection. Julia was familiar with Melioidosis,

[00:15:29] but she didn't understand why this disease would involve the FBI and agency that investigates

[00:15:34] crimes. But regardless, moments later, Julia clicked the link on her calendar and logged into the Zoom

[00:15:40] meeting. After a quick round of introductions, a CDC official began the briefing with a

[00:15:47] discussion of the case of four-year-old Lila Baker, who was still in the Dallas Children's Hospital

[00:15:52] suffering from Melioidosis. Julia also learned from this meeting that two other cases of

[00:15:58] Melioidosis had been reported in the U.S. in the last four months. There was a woman in Kansas

[00:16:03] who died nine days after being admitted to the hospital and a man in Minnesota who was still fighting

[00:16:09] his symptoms. But there was something strange about all three of these cases.

[00:16:15] Melioidosis was caused by a bacteria that, for all intents and purposes, did not exist in the

[00:16:21] United States. The bacteria was mostly found in Southeast Asia and northern Australia.

[00:16:27] Usually, the only way a person in the United States got Melioidosis was by traveling to a region of

[00:16:32] the world where the bacteria was present. But none of these three patients had traveled outside

[00:16:36] the United States any time recently. Julia could understand why the CDC wanted to get to the bottom

[00:16:42] of this mystery, it obviously was in their purview. But she still wasn't sure why the FBI was on

[00:16:48] this call with them. And it was at this point that one of her colleagues reminded the other attendees

[00:16:53] on the meeting that this bacteria was so toxic that it was classified as a Tier 1 select agent.

[00:17:00] And the federal government viewed it as a potential weapon if it got into the wrong hands.

[00:17:05] And so at this point, the official said, the CDC could not rule out the possibility

[00:17:10] that this Melioidosis bacteria had been released into the United States intentionally.

[00:17:17] Meaning, this could potentially be an act of bioterrorism, which is why the FBI was now being

[00:17:22] briefed up on the situation. Julia was absolutely shocked at this revelation. This was quite

[00:17:29] an assignment for her first day on the job and it wasn't even lunchtime. Before her wild first day

[00:17:38] the CDC was over, Julia had ordered DNA analysis from the bacteria that was collected from

[00:17:44] the three patients. And within days, the results confirmed exactly what the CDC had feared.

[00:17:50] The three samples were genetically identical, meaning they had all come from the same place.

[00:17:57] And further investigation revealed to Julia and her colleagues

[00:18:00] that this particular strain of bacteria could be traced to southern Asia.

[00:18:05] Julia's next question was, how did the bacteria move all the way from Asia to three separate

[00:18:10] households in the United States? Had it come here on an infected plant or animal,

[00:18:15] and soil, or commercial product, or could it actually have been spread by a bioterrorist

[00:18:21] who just wanted to hurt people? There were literally thousands of possibilities.

[00:18:27] And Julia knew that the only way to narrow them down was to find out what the three victim

[00:18:31] households had in common. So she picked up a phone and started calling all the families of

[00:18:37] the victims. She needed to let them know that the CDC was going to go to their homes and search

[00:18:42] them. A few days later, Julia drove through the wide open farmlands of northern Texas

[00:18:52] on her way to the home of the baker family. The day before she had spoken with Josie and

[00:18:58] Dustin Baker about the need for her to come and collect samples from their property.

[00:19:03] Other CDC officers were going to scour the homes of the patients from Kansas

[00:19:06] in Minnesota with the same goal, finding Meliodosis bacteria.

[00:19:13] As Julia pulled her car into the gravel driveway in front of the baker's home, a woman came out

[00:19:18] and introduced herself as Josie's sister. She said that Josie and Dustin were still at the hospital

[00:19:22] with Lila. But she was here now to let Julia know that she had free reign to collect whatever

[00:19:28] materials she thought was relevant to her investigation. Julia thanked her, then started searching

[00:19:33] every inch of the baker property for anything that looked like it could have come from Asia.

[00:19:39] She collected samples of food and cleaning products and placed them in plastic bags,

[00:19:43] then she scraped algae from an empty aquarium she found behind the house. Since there had been

[00:19:48] cases where imported tropical fish carried the deadly bacteria. Finally, Julia took soil samples

[00:19:54] from the bank of the stream near the house as well as from the plants. As Julia waved to the

[00:20:03] row in her investigation. Although she was still new to this job, she felt like it was very

[00:20:09] possible to her that the bacteria they were looking for was hidden inside one of the bags and

[00:20:13] bottles in the trunk of her car right now. A couple of weeks later in Lila, Julia sat in a conference

[00:20:23] room with the other CDC investigators on her team. Julia scrolled through the pages of

[00:20:28] laboratory results on her laptop but she admitted to her colleagues that she was totally stumped.

[00:20:33] Investigators had gathered hundreds of samples from the three locations where people got sick.

[00:20:38] But none of them contained any trace of the bacteria. But before Julia could start to discuss next

[00:20:44] steps, one of her colleagues cleared his throat and asked for everyone's attention.

[00:20:49] Then he read out loud from an email that had just come in on his phone.

[00:20:53] And as he read, Julia grew even more troubled. The CDC had just gotten word of a fourth case of

[00:21:00] Melioidosis, this one was in Georgia. The patient was a five-year-old boy who, like the other three

[00:21:07] had never traveled to any region of the world, where this bacteria was present.

[00:21:12] DNA analysis showed that the bacteria that infected him was identical to the samples from

[00:21:17] the other three patients. So he'd most likely gotten it from the same source as all the other

[00:21:23] patients. Julia closed her eyes as she thought about this new information. The news from

[00:21:28] Georgia was obviously distressing but the fact that only one new case had emerged over the course of

[00:21:34] last month was probably good news. If terrorists were trying to use the bacteria as a weapon,

[00:21:40] wouldn't there be many more victims by now? Julia was beginning to think that this outbreak

[00:21:45] couldn't be an act of bioterrorism. But if this outbreak wasn't bioterrorism, then what was it?

[00:21:52] Something was causing people to get sick all across the country and the CDC had no idea what it was.

[00:21:59] As Julia walked back to her office, lost and thought, she suddenly felt resolved.

[00:22:04] Their investigation had indeed been thorough and comprehensive. But clearly, they had to do more.

[00:22:15] A few weeks later, on a warm evening in the middle of August 2021, Josie Baker stood by

[00:22:20] Lila as her daughter's wheelchair was lowered from a van to the ground outside their home.

[00:22:25] Friends and family were gathered by the front door, clapping and cheering.

[00:22:29] After two and a half months in the hospital, Lila was finally home.

[00:22:33] Josie was overwhelmed with emotion as she carefully pushed her daughter up a ramp

[00:22:37] that had been installed outside their house just a week prior. Lila's physical condition

[00:22:42] had stabilized and she was now breathing on her own. But, as Josie watched Dustin lift Lila out of

[00:22:48] her wheelchair and gently lay her on her bed, Josie also knew there was a long and challenging

[00:22:53] road ahead of them. Lila had still not regained her ability to speak or walk, even holding

[00:22:59] her head upright continued to be a challenge. Josie had to accept a painful truth. There was

[00:23:04] a good possibility that her daughter had suffered permanent damage to her nervous system.

[00:23:09] And Josie had another worry. She still had no idea how or where Lila had picked up the

[00:23:14] bacteria. CDC investigators had not found the bacteria on their property, but it still seemed

[00:23:20] possible to Josie that it could still be lurking somewhere in their house.

[00:23:25] So she couldn't shake the idea that if they continued to live in this house,

[00:23:29] at some point somebody else in the family was gonna get this disease as well.

[00:23:36] Later that same month, in one of the conference rooms for the Centers for Disease Control in

[00:23:40] Atlanta, Julia picked up a dry erase pen and started drawing on a whiteboard.

[00:23:45] Julia had been on the case for almost two months, and the agency still had no clue how the

[00:23:49] four patients had contracted this bacteria. Julia knew time was running out to solve this puzzle.

[00:23:55] The more time passed, the greater the chance that the source of the bacteria

[00:23:59] might be spread to other locations. So Julia thought, you know, maybe if she just wrote down

[00:24:05] everything they knew on this whiteboard that maybe somehow it would help her connect all the dots.

[00:24:13] Julia's colleagues watched as she divided the board into four columns, one for each of the patients.

[00:24:19] Under each column, Julia listed key details, including dates, medical symptoms and

[00:24:23] environmental factors that could be relevant. As the board began to fill up,

[00:24:28] the team searched for any common factors that could help narrow their search for the source of

[00:24:32] the bacteria. At some point, Julia had written a ton on this board and just stepped back and looked at

[00:24:38] it, and when she did, she saw it. Three of the four patients showed signs that the infection

[00:24:45] had entered their brains, including the patients in Texas, Georgia and Minnesota.

[00:24:50] Julia realized that this common thread could be an important clue as to how the bacteria

[00:24:55] entered the bodies of these patients. If their brains were infected, the bacteria most likely

[00:25:01] entered their body through their noses rather than through a cut or something they ate or drank.

[00:25:07] Because the quickest route to the brain was through the nasal cavity, meaning there was a very

[00:25:11] good chance that in all of these cases, the bacteria was somehow inhaled. Julia felt re-energized.

[00:25:19] Even though CDC investigators had now made multiple trips to the victim's homes to collect samples,

[00:25:25] Julia knew that they had this information about inhaling the bacteria that they would have

[00:25:30] to visit all of them one more time. Minutes later, Julia left and headed back to her apartment

[00:25:35] and began to pack her suitcase. Over the weeks that followed, Julia and her colleagues returned

[00:25:45] to the homes of all four patients and retrieved more samples for testing. They collected anything

[00:25:51] and everything they could find that could possibly be inhaled, regardless of whether it could have

[00:25:56] come from Asia. Julia and her colleagues knew they were ultimately searching for a needle in a

[00:26:01] haystack, but they had to try. And so by September, Julia and the rest of the CDC team

[00:26:07] had sent hundreds of additional specimens to their laboratory for analysis.

[00:26:13] And finally, an October of 2021, Julia received a call from a microbiologist who was assigned to

[00:26:19] this case. The search was finally over, a sample retrieved from the Georgia site contained traces

[00:26:25] of the meleodosis bacteria. And so after hearing this, it didn't take long for Julia and her team

[00:26:31] to figure out how the bacteria actually made the trip from Asia to America, causing four

[00:26:37] Americans to be attacked by a bacteria so toxic that the government considered it a potential bio weapon.

[00:26:44] But in the case of four-year-old Lila Baker, the spread of the bacteria actually got an assist

[00:26:49] from a very unusual accomplice. Seven months earlier, in March of 2021, while Josie was watching

[00:27:02] Lila hunt for frogs near the stream behind their house, the families beloved pet raccoon,

[00:27:07] Janks, was busy ransacking their kitchen. Janks was on a hunt for food and he had made a huge

[00:27:13] mask as he opened every cabinet and drawer, ripping open boxes and bags in search of a tasty snack.

[00:27:19] Janks eventually climbed onto the counter near the sink and he saw a small bottle of liquid.

[00:27:25] The raccoon soon knocked the bottle off the counter, causing it to break open and spill

[00:27:29] onto the kitchen floor, releasing that very strong floral aroma into the kitchen.

[00:27:35] And then when Josie and the kids entered the house, Janks made a run for it,

[00:27:39] hopping into that puddle and tracking that floral smelling liquid throughout the house as he ran away

[00:27:45] to hide. The bottle that Janks knocked off the shelf was a United States branded product,

[00:27:50] the Josie bought at Walmart a few weeks earlier. And that same product had been purchased

[00:27:56] by all four of the households that have been struck by Melioidosis.

[00:28:01] What Josie and the other families did not realize is that while they had all bought this American

[00:28:06] product at a local American store, it was actually manufactured and bottled at a factory near

[00:28:11] the southern tip of India. The bacteria that causes Melioidosis was known to thrive in the

[00:28:17] better environments of this particular region of India. And somehow in the process of manufacturing

[00:28:23] thousands of bottles of this air freshener known as Better Homes and Gardens, Lavender and

[00:28:28] Camamil essential oil infused aroma therapy room spray, the bacteria got into the liquid inside.

[00:28:35] The bottles were then shipped to Walmart stores all across the United States.

[00:28:41] When customers used the product inside their home, particles of the Melioidosis

[00:28:45] bacteria were sprayed into the air where they were all inhaled by the people who lived there.

[00:28:50] Now most of the people who inhaled the bacteria were healthy enough to fight off the bacteria,

[00:28:55] and they did not get seriously ill. But the victims in Kansas in Minnesota had other conditions

[00:29:01] that made them more vulnerable to this infection. And Lila and the young boy in Georgia were just so

[00:29:07] young that their immature immune systems were unable to fight off the bacteria before serious damage

[00:29:12] was done to their bodies. As soon as the source of this bacteria was identified,

[00:29:21] the CDC alerted Walmart and Walmart quickly discontinued sale of the product

[00:29:25] and withdrew it from the market. Consumers who purchased the spray were told not to throw it away

[00:29:31] or pour it down the drain since that could increase the risk of spreading the bacteria.

[00:29:36] Instead they were directed to put the bottle inside of two Ziploc bags then placed it inside

[00:29:41] of a cardboard box and then physically return it to a Walmart store.

[00:29:46] But that was not quite the end of this story. CDC investigator Julia Petrus eventually learned

[00:29:52] of a fifth potential victim of the strain of the Melioidosis bacteria.

[00:29:57] Jinks, the baker families beloved Petra Cohn who died shortly after breaking the bottle

[00:30:02] that contained the contaminated air freshener. Julia hated the idea of disturbing Jinks' grave

[00:30:08] in the baker's backyard, but there was a chance that the Melioidosis bacteria had actually spread

[00:30:13] into the environment after he was buried. And so on April 19th 2022, Julia and other CDC

[00:30:21] officials returned to the baker's home in Texas and dug up Jinks' body.

[00:30:26] But after doing some analysis, Julia and the baker family were relieved to discover

[00:30:31] that although Jinks had died of Melioidosis, no additional bacteria was detected in the soil

[00:30:37] or vegetation surrounding Jinks' grave. As of late 2023, Lila Baker has not regained her ability to

[00:30:45] speak her walk. Josie Quitter job at the animal hospital and devoted herself full-time to the

[00:30:50] care for daughter. Sadly, the little boy in Georgia died from the infection. However, the other two

[00:30:56] human patients did make full recoveries. From ballin studios and one re, this is Mr. Ballin's

[00:31:19] We use aliases sometimes because we don't know the names of the real people in the story.

[00:31:24] And also, in most cases, we can't know exactly what was said, but everything is based on a lot

[00:31:30] of research. And a reminder, the content in this episode is not intended to be a substitute for

[00:31:36] professional medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. This episode was written by Matt Olmos.

[00:31:42] Our editor is Heather Dundis, sound design is by Ryan Patesta. Our coordinating producer

[00:31:47] is Taylor Sniffin and our managing producer is Sophia Martins. Our senior producer is Alex Benadon,

[00:31:53] our associate producers and researchers are Sarah Bytac, Antasia Pelaconda,

[00:31:58] fact checking was done by Sheila Patterson. For ballin studios, our head of production is Zack

[00:32:03] Lebitt. Script editing is by Scott Allen and Evan Allen. Our coordinating producer is Mattup Zair.

[00:32:09] Executive producers are myself, Mr. Ballin, and Nick Witters. For Wondry, our head of sound

[00:32:15] is Marcellino Villapondo. Senior producers are Laura Donna Palavota and Dave Shilling.

[00:32:21] Senior managing producer is Ryan Moore. Our executive producers are Aaron O'Flaherty and

[00:32:26] Marcellino Villapondo.