Superbugs Emerge Among Urban Poor
May 29th, 2007Via: MyWay / AP:
Drug-resistant staph infections have spread to the urban poor, rising almost seven-fold in recent years in some Chicago neighborhoods, a new study finds.
Researchers said the crowded living conditions of public housing and jails may speed up the person-to-person spread of infection.
The superbugs, first seen mainly in hospitals and nursing homes, have turned up recently among athletes, prisoners and people who get illegal tattoos.
Called methicillin-resistant staphylococcus aureus, or MRSA, these staph germs can cause skin infections that in rare cases have led to pneumonia, bloodstream infections and a painful, flesh-destroying condition. MRSA is hard to treat because the bacteria have developed resistance to the penicillin drug family.
FYI, apparently honey is the only known “cure” for MRSA, flesh-eating bacteria, other non-healing skin wounds, etc.: http://www.manukahoney.co.uk/article3.html
It’s VRE you have to worry about. I saw
one case in my life, terrible.
Vancomycin Resistant Enterocci
Here’s another Superbug for the party, this one for the International Set:
http://www.cnn.com/2007/HEALTH/conditions/05/29/tb.flight/index.html
. . . . .
ATLANTA, Georgia (CNN) — Federal health authorities are looking for people who may have been exposed aboard a plane to someone infected with a drug-resistant form of tuberculosis known as XDR-TB.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said Tuesday that the case involves a U.S. citizen who traveled on two international flights. XDR-TB was recently defined as a subtype of multiple-drug resistant tuberculosis. It can be fatal.
As with all TB, the disease can be spread through the air. “In this case, the infected patient traveled on two trans-Atlantic air flights and, in doing so, may have exposed passengers and crew to XDR-TB,” the agency said.
“A federal quarantine order has been issued and CDC is currently collaborating with U.S., state and local health departments, international ministries of health, the airline industry, and WHO (World Health Organization).”
The infected patient traveled to Europe via Air France Flight 385, departing Atlanta on May 12 and arriving in Paris on May 13, the CDC said.
The patient returned to North America last Thursday aboard Czech Air Flight 0104 from Prague, Czech Republic, to Montreal, Canada, then drove into the United States.
“Since May 25, the patient has been hospitalized in respiratory isolation and is undergoing additional medical evaluation,” the CDC said.
The patient, who has few symptoms, has radiographic evidence of pulmonary TB and tests positive for XDR-TB, the agency said.
“On the basis of the patient’s clinical and laboratory status, and lack of receiving adequate treatment for XDR-TB, this patient was considered potentially infectious at the time of his airline travel, and meets the criteria in the WHO guidelines for initiating an airline contact investigation,” it said.
. . . . .
I wonder what the time parameters are on a federal quarantine order for a highly infectious disease with few symptoms which we can’t effectively treat?
Also a problem in NZ’s urban poor, exacerbated by the collapse of district nursing services.
I read long ago that the problem with infections in UK hospitals was so bad that their commercial disinfectants were of no use in curbing the spread. But what was most ironic was that they were undergoing trials of (unmentioned) natural means and that it appeared to be effective. Makes you wonder why all the silence but then you had to think that all those companies who make their millions selling their ineffective crap would be very upset to lose that business to something found at the farmers market.
Kevin, you can’t make this stuff up; The Extreme TB airline passenger has a father-in-law who works for the CDC!
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/05/31/health/main2869316.shtml
In an odd twist, Speaker’s father-in-law works as a microbiologist at a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention laboratory that studies tuberculosis and other bacterial infections.