Despite Corona del Mar teen’s illness, officials aren’t worried about ocean water quality

A week after the mother of a 16-year-old Corona del Mar High School student raised questions of whether ocean water played a part in her daughter becoming severely ill, local health experts said they see no cause for concern.

Julianne Bartz reportedly was hospitalized this month with a dangerous form of pneumonia about two weeks after participating in a junior lifeguards regional competition at Huntington State Beach on July 22.

Her mother, Catherine, would not comment to the Daily Pilot last week about her daughter’s condition.

But she earlier told KCBS-TV/2 that an infectious-disease doctor had discovered her daughter had been exposed to strep bacteria, possibly contracted orally through ocean water.

Catherine Bartz wondered whether bacteria from a sewage spill that occurred in Los Angeles three days before the competition may have caused her daughter’s illness.

“So the infectious-disease doctor was finally able to get a culture … and one of the first things she asked us was if she had been swimming,” Bartz told the TV station. “And that’s when the light kind of came on. She had been very, very healthy up until the day she did that regional competition where she was in the ocean for so long. And in the back of my mind, it had always been a question.”

Jessica Good, a spokeswoman for the Orange County Health Care Agency, said she knew of no other illnesses possibly linked to the lifeguard competition and that the agency had received no official diagnosis from Julianne’s doctor or family.

Generally, the agency accepts reports when a person experiences a possibly ocean-related illness.

Such bather illness reports have not shown a doctor’s diagnosis of pneumonia since 1997, Good said.

Samples are regularly taken from ocean water to test them for bacteria, Good said.

“There are 140 locations in Orange County oceans and bay waters that samples are taken from,” Good wrote in an email. “These samples are taken at least weekly.”

The Health Care Agency said one water sample from Huntington State Beach was collected at Magnolia Street on July 21, the day before the junior lifeguards regional competition.

Magnolia Street is about 1,000 feet from Newland Street, where Good said Julianne and the other junior guards were swimming.

The sample was collected because of a higher than acceptable level of enterococci bacteria in that area on July 20, according to Good.

Enterococci bacteria are usually found in high concentrations in human feces. They’re also used as indicators of fecal contamination in recreational waters, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

Enterococci also can be found in soil, storm water, animals and sewage.

According to the EPA, enterococci bacteria can cause diseases of the skin, eyes, ears and respiratory tract. They also can cause infections to wounds and the urinary tract, according to the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Jennifer Cabral, a spokeswoman for the Orange County Sanitation District, said her agency did not have concerns about local water quality after the Los Angeles sewage spill.

“Ocean waters have met our public health state standards,” she said. “We do not have any evidence that the L.A. sewage spill reached Orange County waters.”

Beaches just south of the San Gabriel River and Seal Beach were closed immediately after the spill July 19. The water samples the Sanitation District took during that period did not exceed state standards for bacteria, according to Cabral.

Brian O’Rourke, junior lifeguard captain for Newport Beach, said he usually doesn’t worry about the possibility of dangerous bacteria in the ocean.

The county Health Care Agency regularly updates the Newport Beach Fire Department’s Marine Operations about water quality, O’Rourke said.

“The water is generally clean,” he said. “There’s been nothing this summer regarding water quality that gave us cause for concern.”

O’Rourke said he called Catherine Bartz to ask about her daughter’s condition but had not heard back.

The Health Care Agency encourages swimmers who might be experiencing an ocean-related illness to call (714) 433-6280 to be interviewed and file a complaint.