A landscaper in Cartersville, Ga., has become the third person in recent weeks to contract flesh-eating bacteria in the Southeast, WXIA in Atlanta is reporting.

The victim, Bobby Vaughn, told the news organization that his symptoms started off innocently enough.

"I just started feeling very sick," Vaughn, 33, told the station during a telephone interview. "I was throwing up and had a backache. I just thought it was a little infection."

Vaughn said when he began to swell, he went to the hospital, where they initially put him on antibiotics and fluids but ultimately operated on him five times.

"I still have some skin grafts and reconstructive surgeries ahead, but they think the bacteria isn't spreading anymore," Vaughn said.

Vaughn is in Doctors Hospital in Augusta, Ga., down the hall from Aimee Copeland, a 24-year-old graduate student who has had her leg, other foot and both hands amputated after a bout with flesh-eating bacteria.

A female paramedic in Greenville, S.C., also is battling flesh-eating bacteria, WXIA reports.