Jan. 19th, 2011 at 1:14 PM
May. 25th, 2010 at 5:26 PM
From Reuters Health Information
Faster, Stronger, Deadlier: the MRSA Superbug
By Frederik Joelving
NEW YORK (Reuters Health) May 14 - When she first described it in 1961, Patricia Jevons, a British bacteriologist, may have had a hard time imagining that the tiny bug she was staring at would soon become a penicillin-mocking juggernaut -- a superbug that kills an estimated 19,000 Americans a year and make millions more sick.
Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus -- or MRSA for short -- is the subject of journalist Maryn McKenna's new book Superbug: The Fatal Menace of MRSA (Free Press, March 2010). She spoke with Reuters Health on Thursday about the bacteria's toll on public health and how we may, unwittingly, be helping a new strain along (see more on http://blogs.reuters.com/great-debate/2010/05/12/a-conversation-with-maryn-mckenna-author-of-superbug-the-fatal-menace-of-mrsa/).
"One of the problems with MRSA, one of the reasons why it's become what I consider a true crisis, is that I really don't think we've been taking it sufficiently seriously for a very long time," McKenna said.
MRSA first crossed the Atlantic in 1968, landing in what used to be called Boston City Hospital. Then it inched its way across the country until 1980, when it infected a burn victim at Harborview Medical Center in Seattle and caused a devastating outbreak.
( Read more... )
May. 17th, 2010 at 5:20 PM
Hospitals see a jump in childhood MRSA infections A study in Pediatrics of 25 U.S. hospitals found the number of methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus infections among children increased roughly tenfold between 1999 and 2008. The report, which found 21 cases of MRSA per 1,000 hospital admissions, also noted that most of the staph infections were contracted outside the hospital setting. Google/The Associated Press (5/17)
Apr. 26th, 2010 at 6:40 PM
Study: Some patient groups more likely than others to carry MRSA A U.S. study of more than 2,000 patients showed methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus was found in the noses of 20% of long-term elderly patients, 16% of HIV-positive patients and 14% to 15% of kidney dialysis patients, compared with 1% of the general U.S. population. HealthDay News (4/23)
Airborne fungus outbreak spreads across northwest U.S. and Canada A new strain of the airborne fungus Cryptococcus gattii is spreading across the northwestern part of the U.S. and British Columbia in Canada, according to researchers. The strain can cause coughing, chest pains, headaches and other symptoms in otherwise healthy humans and animals, and has been found to have an unusually high mortality rate, the researchers said. Reuters (4/22)
Apr. 8th, 2010 at 12:25 PM
Feb. 11th, 2010 at 8:32 AM
Few among the general public are losing sleep over antibiotic resistance or the absence of effective new antibiotics. People generally have faith or have been lulled into believing that medical scientists can develop effective new antibiotics whenever needed because they have always done so in the past.
By the time most people wake up to the realities of the situation, it will be too late. Antibiotic-resistant infections are becoming the next great equalizer, and this is not just a problem for the elderly or the immune-suppressed. Friends and family, rich and poor alike, will succumb to infections that should be curable but aren't, and everyone will be looking around for someone to blame.
And who should be blamed?
- Pushy patients who refuse to leave the office without their antibiotics, even when told they don't need them?
- Physicians who write antibiotic prescriptions for self-limiting viral illnesses out of fear of angering their patients or risking accusations of negligence?
- Farmers who treat their animals with antibiotics to keep them healthy?
- Pharmaceutical companies who won't invest in new antibiotic development?
- Or regulatory agencies that make it difficult or impossible to get a new antimicrobial through the approval process?
The many factors that have contributed to the current crisis have already been debated, but these sobering facts remain:
- More US patients die of MRSA infections than HIV/AIDS and tuberculosis combined.
- Only 2 new antibiotics -- doripenem and telavancin -- have been approved in the past 3 years.
- We have no drugs to treat infections with some strains of multi-drug-resistant gram-negative bacilli, like Pseudomonas aeruginosa and Acinetobacter baumanii.
We may finally have arrived at the era of the untreatable bacterial infection.
Full article here:
www.medscape.com/viewarticle/715971 (free registration)
Nov. 3rd, 2009 at 11:41 AM
Deadly MRSA strain appears partly immune to treatment The USA600 strain of methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus infects the bloodstream and is five times more lethal than other MRSA strains, and it appears to be partly immune to a drug used to treat it, researchers said. The study found about 50% of patients infected with the strain died within a month. HealthDay News (11/1)
Aug. 13th, 2009 at 11:58 AM
Researchers note increase in MRSA infections
By Jean DerGurahian
Posted: August 12, 2009 - 2:00 pm EDT
Hospital admissions for methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus infections are growing along with instances of community-associated MRSA, according to the results of a new study.
Total hospital admissions for patients with skin and soft tissue infections—of which MRSA is the most prevalent—increased 29% from 2000 to 2004, according to the report titled Trends in U.S. Hospital Admissions for Skin and Soft Tissue Infections. The results appear in the September issue of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's journal
Emerging Infectious Diseases.
At the same time, community-associated MRSA accounted for 14% of those admissions, becoming a major cause of skin and soft tissue MRSA infections, according to the researchers. The greatest increase in infection admissions were among patients younger than 65 and occurred in urban settings more often than rural centers. “We therefore believe that the clinical and economic effects of CA-MRSA are substantial and growing, and that this increase should be a focus of additional research,” the researchers wrote.
The researchers studied five years of hospital admissions for which skin infections were the principal diagnosis. The data come from the Healthcare Cost and Utilization Project National Inpatient Sample, which represents discharge data from about 20% of U.S. hospitals.
Jul. 28th, 2009 at 6:57 PM
Well, I'm sure everyone here has heard of MRSA...I just got this news today; this is CDC's publication--Emerging Infectious Diseases:
Volume 15, Number 8–August 2009
Letter
Human-to-Dog Transmission of Methicillin-Resistant Staphylococcus aureus
Rest of story here: http://www.cdc.gov/eid/content/15/8/1328.htm
The news just gets better and better...
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