At least 39 dead from killer bacteria outbreak in Germany

Updated: June 17, 2011Berlin:

At least 39 people have died from an outbreak in Germany of a killer strain of E Coli bacteria but the rate of new infections continues to drop, authorities said today.

The national health center, the Robert Koch Institute (RKI), added one fatality to its daily report on the Enterohaemorrhagic E Coli (EHEC) contamination, which emerged in early May.

It said the confirmed death toll in Germany itself had risen to 38, in addition to a woman in Sweden who is believed to have been infected during a visit to Germany days before she died.