Ibuprofen-induced meningitis

An interesting case history, published in Discover Magazine's Vital Signs feature in June of 2011.  Some relevant excerpts:

“John was hospitalized uptown four days ago,” she told me. “It started then just like it did tonight, with a headache and confusion.” The 
spinal tap done uptown had shown a high white blood cell count, indicative of infection, but all the cultures were negative. John had stayed in the ICU and gotten better overnight—a surprise for the uptown staff, who then diagnosed viral meningitis....

In a Vital Signs column in this magazine 17 years ago, infectious-disease physician Abigail Zuger described the conundrum of a young woman with recurrent meningitis. Hospitalized four times in a matter of months, the patient exhibited high fevers, delirium, and a stiff neck—all signs of life-threatening 
bacterial, septic meningitis. CAT scans were normal. Spinal taps revealed high white cell counts in the cerebrospinal fluid—usually a harbinger of severe infection—but bacterial and viral cultures grew nothing. The patient was becoming ill and then abruptly getting better. The fourth time, to general eye-rolling, a medical student was tasked with asking the woman for the umpteenth time whether she had taken anything, anything, prior to getting sick. He hit pay dirt: Advil...

No more than 100 cases of ibuprofen-induced meningitis have been reported in the 
literature. But you have to 
wonder, given that ibuprofen 
is practically in the drinking water, how many more mistaken cases of “viral meningitis” are out there.