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A 34-year-old woman was fighting for her life last night after being struck down by a flesh-eating disease.

 Experts at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital where she is being treated are on alert to see if the disease is spreading, after recording two serious cases in the past month.

 The woman was in intensive care last night with a 'remote' chance of survival.

 On Wednesday, the woman suffered severe pain in her left thigh and went to the accident and emergency department.

 Doctors later found the flesh-eating bug, group-A streptococcus, in her joints and blood.

 They amputated her left leg, which had been badly damaged when necrotising fasciitis had 'eaten up' the muscle.

 However, the bacteria eventually spread to her internal organs.

 Intensive care unit consultant Dr Lai Kang-yiu said the woman had shown two atypical symptoms - no obvious wounds and multiple liver abscesses.

 'We are trying to find out if there are other organisms causing the complications.'  The woman's husband and two sons had shown no symptoms but they had been tested for the bacteria. The results were not yet available.

 Dr Dominic Tsang Ngai-chong, consultant microbiologist, said the hospital had recorded about 20 patients infected with group-A streptococcus so far this year.

 Most had shown mild symptoms such as sore throat and soft tissue infections.

 Only one other had developed the flesh-eating symptom - an 86-year-old man who died last month.

 'As we have two cases in a short period of time, we will watch out if there is an upsurge. But at this stage, there is no evidence to say so.'  Dr Tsang said the bacteria normally existed in the mouth or skin.

 'They are common bacteria, we still don't know why some people will have serious complications and die while others are just carrying the bacteria.'  Dr Yuen Kwok-yung, a microbiologist at the University of Hong Kong, said five per cent of adults with a sore throat carried the bacteria. But it was rare for the flesh-eating symptoms to develop.



Flesh-eating bug leaves mother critical