Man Who Lost Face & Limbs To Flesh-Eating Disease Says It Was Best YearOf His Life

This dad says the year he lost all four limbs to a flesh-eating bacteria was the best of his life.
Ex-pub owner Alex Lewis, 34, may have lost his lips to the gruesome infection but didn't lose his sense of humour - joking: "I look like a Simpsons character".
Alex is now well on the way to learning to walk again after nearly three months of treatment at Queen Mary's Hospital in Roehampton, south west London.
He can play with his four-year-old son Sam again and plans to walk down the aislewith his partner Lucy, who
stood by him when told he had a 97 per cent chance of death.
Despite the horror illness, Alex says he feels better than ever - and he'd do it all again.
"It's because it's been by far the most brilliant year" he told the BBC World Service's Outlook show.

"I've seen incredible things this year, things I'd never ever have got to see, and I wouldn't want to not see it.
"It's really hard to comprehend. I think it's incredible how the human body and mind can adapt. I feel great every day when I wake up, I feel really strong and healthy.
"It's been life-changing in probably more positives than negatives. It's made me realise how precious life is."
Alex, from Stockbridge, Hampshire, collapsed in November 2013 and was taken to intensive care, where he suffered toxic shock caused by usually harmless Streptococcus A bacteria.
He thought he had "man flu" for two weeks until he passed blood in his urine and saw purple and grey blodges all over his skin.
His organs started to fail as he developed septicaemia (blood poisoning) and he survived a week in intensive care despite odds stacked wildly against him.
The illness had taken his toll and he had to have one arm and both legs removed.
He lost the other arm when he rolled over onto it in his sleep and the bone, already weakened by his infection, snapped clean in half.

But Alex said he felt more sorry for Lucy than for himself - and now views an achievement as being able to drink a cup of coffee in a year's time.
He's been helped by hundreds of friends, who have helped him set up the Alex Lewis Trust and raised more than £180,000.
"So now its 2015," he wrote jubilantly on his blog yesterday.
"Along with continuing walking school we will be enduring five more operations, attempting a world record breaking skydive, learning to hand cycle, getting hitched and much more.
"My family and the Trust cannot thank you all enough for your kindness and support."


Serious invasive strep A infections are rare, with only around one in every 33,000 people developing them a year in England. They are usually treated with injections of antibiotics for seven to 10 days.


Mirror UK