Student Loses Limbs After Contracting “Fresher’s Flu”: What to Know About Meningococcal Septicemia

A 19-year-old university student says she is lucky to be alive after surviving a deadly, life-threatening flu, which led to the amputation of both her legs and all her fingers. Ketia Moponda was diagnosed with meningococcal septicemia, a severe blood infection caused by the Neisseria meningitidis bacterium, leading to fever, a characteristic non-fading purple rash, and signs of shock and organ failure. Ketia says she caught the fresher's flu – eight days after arriving at university – and felt like she was “going to die". A marketing and advertising student at De Montfort University in Leicester, Ketia also developed sepsis, where her body developed sepsis as the immune system started attacking its own tissues and organs. And so, doctors had

no choice but to amputate all ten of her fingers and both legs after they had shrivelled due to lack of blood flow. “I woke from the operation and just cried,” Ketia told The Sun. “I felt like my whole life had just begun, and now I had to start all over again differently.”

How did Ketia's symptoms start?

Ketia said she began feeling extremely drowsy while eating pizza for dinner. The next morning, she felt even worse and had to call her cousin after she felt like she was going to pass out. Apart from having a fever and body aches, Ketia said she felt her skin had become colourless and pale, and in a few days' time her feet started becoming green and swollen. She was sent to the hospital in an ambulance, where doctors had to induce a coma for two days. “I couldn’t see or speak, and it was a whole week before I started speaking,” she said. “Most of the time I didn’t know where I was.” She is now getting prosthetic legs and has started attending a rehab centre while waiting for prosthetic fingers too.

What is meningococcal septicemia?

Meningococcal disease is a rare infection that is caused by the bacteria Neisseria meningitidis or N. meningitidis. According to experts, it can infect your meninges – the three membranes that cover your brain and spinal cord. Membranes are thin layers of tissue that protect what they surround, like the skin around an orange or grapefruit. Doctors say meningococcal disease is extremely serious and can be fatal without treatment. Get medical help immediately if you have symptoms of the disease.

Signs and symptoms of meningococcal septicemia

Common symptoms of meningococcal septicemia include:

• Being bothered by bright light
• Diarrhoea
• High fever
• Headache
• Nausea and vomiting
• Rashes on the skin that look like dark and discoloured pinpoints
• Stiffness in the neck
• Confusion and irritability
• Tiredness and fatigue
• Difficulty walking
• Grunting and moaning
• Joint and muscle pain
• Loss of appetite

What are the risk factors of meningococcal septicemia?

Meningococcal disease spreads from person to person, usually through close contact with someone who has it. It spreads through spit through activities like:

• Coughing
• Kissing
• Sharing drinks or eating utensils like forks or spoons
• Sneezing
• The risk factors include:
• Being less than a year old, a teenager, or an early adult
• Having a spleen injury
• Having sickle cell disease
• Living in the same area as a lot of other people, like college campuses
• Taking complement inhibitor medications