The deadliest superbug yet — Candida auris — is invading hospitals and nursing homes, killing a staggering 60 percent of patients it infects. New York City is Ground Zero, with three-quarters of the cases.
Some exposed patients don’t succumb to infection but silently carry the germ and infect others. A patient treated first in New York City unknowingly carried it upstate to Rochester General Hospital, where he died weeks ago. The lethal germ has also reached New Jersey, Michigan, Illinois and Massachusetts, with 122 cases reported so far this year, up from only six last year.
The germ — a fungus — lingers on bedrails and on the uniforms and hands of doctors and nurses. Once it gets inside a catheter or breathing device and invades a patient’s body, it kills.
Candida auris is already in 20 hospitals in New York, including prestigious medical centers. Acting CDC Director Anne Schuchat calls it a “catastrophic threat.” Strong words, but don’t expect health authorities to do much. They’re saying what they always say — patients dying from these infections were already seriously ill. Well, duh. Who else goes to a hospital?
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I'm looking at a couple of major orthopedic surgeries in the next year, but the infection rates at hospitals puts a lot of fear into me.
ReplyDeleteMy grandmother, an otherwise vital and resilient died after contracting a secondary infection at a local hospital. I don't understand whey the new methods for sanitizing and screening aren't demanded by those in authority. 8:02...good luck and select the physician and hospital based on infection rate!
ReplyDeleteWhen all humans are dead and buried the viruses and cockroaches will rule the earth. Viruses are being stored in labs in Maryland that could put an end to all life on earth but they are for study purposes...and once in awhile they are mailed out to the wrong address and end up at the FDA. Lots of care .....lots of care. NOT
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