The freshest ocean on the planet

With miles upon miles of sea surrounding the land, Hawaii must have the freshest ocean on the planet. That is the illusion.

Something happens at shorelines where land, water, humans, and varying temperatures collide. At this writing, a family friend is in Hilo's hospital with one arm amputated and her chances of survival very slim from a flesh-eating bacteria. (Author's note: the woman died within two days, after further amputation.) She picked up the bacteria in an open wound while bathing in ocean-fed, volcano-heated tide pools. It sounds science-fiction bizarre to me that this could happen -- in our day and age with environmental awareness, cures for leprosy, and healing for gangrene that someone could in one day go unconscious, lose one arm, and possibly die. From swimming in paradise.

I think this is a freak accident until my husband googles it and finds 875 documented cases of a flesh-eating "virus" in the Hawaiian Islands. Shark attacks and rogue waves, both of which can be avoided, are the media-friendly threats in Hawaii. It seems like no one's talking about our flesh-eating bacteria.