Op/ed: Deadly Bacteria May Be Moving to a Beach Near You

If you’re a beachgoer, chances are you’ve braved the waves with a small scrape or swallowed a mouthful of ocean water. Such occurrences are getting riskier as temperatures warm and a potentially harmful bacteria, Vibrio, moves farther and farther north,  University of Maryland researcher writes in a recent article in Scientific American.

Kyle Brumfield, a visiting postdoctoral associate at the University of Maryland Institute for Advanced Computer Studies, is working with colleagues including Distinguished University Professor Rita Colwell to develop predictive computer models to forecast the risk of coming into contact with Vibrio bacteria in the Chesapeake Bay.

On a small, gently rocking research boat anchored just offshore in Chesapeake Bay, I lowered a sterile plastic bottle into the water to collect a sample for studying aquatic microbes. Workers nearby dredged oysters from the shallows, and families played in the low waves. To them, it was a perfect summer day. But hidden in the seemingly tranquil waters were Vibrio bacteria, members of a group that exists naturally in coastal environments around the world. Some cause diarrhea, cramping and nausea, and some can produce severe flesh-eating infections and even lead to death.

Vibrio live freely in the water, concentrate in sediment and on plastics, and colonize the surfaces and guts of shellfish, fish and zooplankton. For those organisms, the bacteria can often be harmless or even beneficial. The bacteria also recycle nutrients such as carbon and nitrogen by breaking down organic material. They are found in both saltwater and freshwater bodies, and they thrive in warm water. That’s why for many years Vibrio infections—called vibriosis—generally occurred along the hottest U.S. coastlines, particularly the Gulf Coast. But climate change is warming once cool waters, and vibriosis cases have been relentlessly spreading northward. Today they are reported across the Eastern Seaboard, along the Baltic Sea in northern Europe, and even as far north as Alaska and Finland.

Read the rest in Scientific American, or read the new paper by Brumfield, Colwell and colleagues published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences on how climate shifts are changing the risks of Vibrio.