Doctors have identified a "superbug" that is responsible for 90,000 cases nationwide annually. This drug-resistant form of staph has become so prevalent it may cause more deaths than those attributed to HIV.
Drug-resistant organisms are increasing at an explosive pace. One investigation examined the national prevalence of drug-resistant Staphylococcus aureus, or MRSA, for methicillin-resistant staph aureus. The bug can invade the bloodstream. It has been associated with hospital infections, but now is spreading in communities.
The other superstrain is an emergent form of Streptococcus pneunomiae. Even though a vaccine exists to protect against seven related strains, there is no vaccine against this one. The bacteria often cause ear infections in children and pneumonia in the elderly.
The strain is of such concern that physicians may have to relearn the lost art of fine-needle eardrum puncture to drain fluid from the ears of infected children.
A U.S. report, published today in the Journal of the American Medical Association, provides the first overall estimate of infections caused by MRSA. Infections can be deadly, or cause something as minor as a mild skin irritation. The U.S. study focused on the most invasive form of the infection.
Open wounds and tainted medical equipment are considered major ways to spread infections, which is why they often occur in hospitals.
The researchers' estimates are extrapolated from 2005 surveillance data from nine, mostly urban, regions considered representative of the United States. There were 5,287 invasive infections reported that year in people living in those regions, which would translate to an estimated 94,360 cases nationally, the researchers said.
Most cases were life-threatening bloodstream infections. About 10 per cent involved so-called flesh-eating disease, according to the study led by researchers at the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
There were 988 reported deaths among infected people in the study, a rate of 6.3 per 100,000. That would translate to 18,650 deaths a year, although the researchers don't know if MRSA caused all cases.
If all these deaths were related to staph infections, the total would exceed better-known causes of death including AIDS, which killed an estimated 17,011 Americans in 2005, said Dr. Elizabeth Bancroft of the Los Angeles County Health Department, the editorial author.
Physicians in New York, Alaska and Massachusetts also have identified the strain.
Antibiotic misuse destroys weak bugs and leaves hardy survivors behind that learn new and sometimes deadly tricks.
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