Word: mrsa
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 2000-2009
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...heard or read the headlines: that methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) is deadlier than AIDS; that the killer bug is alarmingly more widespread than anyone thought; that it's in your kids' locker rooms and at your gym. Stories abound of young high-school athletes becoming infected with MRSA and dying within weeks, and you're starting to worry about whether that nick or scrape you just got could be your last...
...here's what you really need to know. Yes, the latest study conducted by the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) and published in the Journal of the American Medical Association found that MRSA is more prevalent than any previous estimates had suggested. In the CDC's survey of nine states in 2005, there were 32 cases of MRSA infection for every 100,000 people. (By comparison, in that same year, the incidence of invasive pneumonia or flu infections ranged from less than one to 14 cases per 100,000 people.) Extrapolating from these states' statistics, the researchers estimated that there...
Still, it's important to remember that these bacteria can be treated with antibiotics - as long as the right antibiotics are used. By definition, these strains of staph will not respond to methicillin, but with culturing, physicians should be able to control MRSA infections with other classes of antibiotics. And, in general, in otherwise healthy people, staph infections are treatable and rarely fatal...
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, more than 70% of the bacteria that cause infections in hospitals are resistant to at least one antibiotic. Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA), which causes boils or pimples on the skin, is only the latest superbug to make the rounds and has appeared in dozens of high school and college athletic locker rooms, as well as in three NFL locker rooms. Drug-resistant tuberculosis cases, including those of the variety affecting Speaker, have risen along with peaks in AIDS cases, as people with weakened immune systems are especially vulnerable to infection...
Bacteria are on the march. Researchers found that nearly 75% of serious skin infections treated at clinics in Atlanta were resistant to the antibiotics that are normally used to cure such infections. The bacteria responsible, known as methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA), used to be seen mostly in hospitals but are now turning up all across the U.S. MRSA can still be treated with other antibiotics, but the Infectious Diseases Society of America has called for Congress to pressure the pharmaceutical industry to develop new, stronger drugs to fight the superbugs...