I recently was cleaning my tank after my heater went out and everything died. After this happened, I started getting a algea infestation, with lots of green hair algea. So, I thought the best way to get it back to normal would be to clean the rocks with a little elbow grease and a toothbrush. I took the rocks out and started cleaning, and like I said earlier, everything was "dead". After about 20 to 30 minutes I started sneezing uncontrollably, and then after about an hour or so, I started having shortness of breath, and very shallow rapid breathing. I thought if I just lay down for a bit it would get better. After another 1 hour, I couldn't catch my breath and decided I better go to the hospital. The usual tests were done, EKG, xray, labs, all negative. By the next am, my labs indicated I was septic and needed to be transferred to the ICU. A day later and a lot of fluids to keep my blood pressure up, I was moved back to a regular room. 3 days later I was able to go home, and a week later I was about 95% back to normal, still occasional shortness of breath with activity. I think that I inhaled some palytoxin from the "dead zoas" on the rocks while I was cleaning. My LFS owner was the one who put 2+2 for me...THANKS Dan!
