Report: Playboy mansion visitors acquire respiratory infection, for a change

Those of us who've been around the block in Hollywood a few times know to associate the Playboy Mansion with sleaze 'n' disease, but legionellosis is a new one. 170 mansion visitors are said to have acquired an illness that may be caused by this bacterium, according to this Los Angeles Times article. It's a "milder form of Legionnaires' disease caused by a bacterium that grows in warm water and can take root in hot tubs or parts of air-conditioning systems, according to the CDC." / UPDATE: health investigators say that people who became sick visited several locations, and the Playboy Mansion may or may not have been the culprit.

• [Jean-Luc Turbo]

  I’m sure it started in the grotto:

  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IDdr-fv7o0A

  • [Xeni Jardin]

    It’s possible. I’ve been there! I behaved myself. I would not bathe in that water.

    • [Jean-Luc Turbo]

      When you have to say that you behaved yourself…

• [Antinous / Moderator]

  It also enjoys growing in your faucet aerators. It’s a good idea to clean them occasionally.

• [jtf]

  Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Legionairres_disease#United_States.2C_2011) says the culprit is suspected to be a fog machine. Well, shucks.

• [Roy Trumbull]

  I’m sure some southern minister will pounce on it.

• [silkox]

  One of my first jobs was in a microbiology lab working on Legionnaire’s disease, back when it was more of a mystery. The fog machine, definitely. The Grotto is probably teeming with another bug we worked on, Pseudomonas aeruginosa.

• [Anonymous]

  There are two extra details that make this *EXTRA* delicious:

  1) The group was there for an anti-vax fundraiser and
  2) the victims are all professional domain squatters or wannabe squatters.

  Couldn’t have happened to a nicer bunch of fuckers.