SerpApi.Org
What started as a routine trip to Taco Bell has turned into a nearly two-week hospital stay for Southfield resident Ella-Salone Jones. She shares her story amid a multistate cyclosporiasis outbreak.
Jones said she ate at a Southfield Taco Bell on June 23 and again in early July. Shortly afterward, she developed severe gastrointestinal symptoms that sent her to Corewell Health, where doctors diagnosed her with cyclospora.
"Thirty to 40 times a day. It stopped, and it started again, and it is miserable," Jones said when describing her restroom usage.
Jones said she remains hospitalized because of complications related to her kidney disease.
"They won't let me go home because I can't hold anything," she said. "I have Stage 5 kidney disease, and if my kidneys dry up, I can pass."
Federal health officials have been investigating the outbreak, which has sickened thousands of people nationwide.
Earlier in the investigation, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration said testing appeared to detect cyclospora in a sample of shredded lettuce supplied by Taylor Farms. The company distributed lettuce to Taco Bell locations.
However, the FDA later reversed that finding, saying the result was a false positive and that the parasite had not been identified in lettuce samples tested so far. The investigation into the source of the outbreak remains ongoing.
Jones is represented by food safety attorney Ron Simon, who said his firm is representing hundreds of people who say they became ill during the outbreak.
"By the time the investigators find out about the outbreak, the implicated product is already gone, and I think that's what we saw in this case," Simon said.
Simon said roughly 10% to 20% of his clients affected by the outbreak have required hospitalization.
Jones said her recovery has been especially difficult because she cannot take Bactrim, the standard treatment for cyclospora, due to an underlying medical condition.
"They [doctors] had to find something that can help me, and they don't even really know if it's helping me," Jones said.
For now, Jones said her hospital room has become home. The illness has also forced her family to cancel a long-awaited trip to Disney World with her three children.
"I had a vacation for my children, and I can't take them now," she said. "We've been waiting for a year and a half."
Jones urged anyone experiencing persistent symptoms to seek medical attention.
According to Simon, Jones has accumulated more than $100,000 in medical bills while receiving treatment.
