Posted on 09/15/2012 11:38:10 PM PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
A deadly, drug-resistant superbug outbreak that began last summer at the National Institutes of Health Clinical Center claimed its seventh victim Sept. 7, when a seriously ill boy from Minnesota succumbed to a bloodstream infection, officials said Friday.
The boy was the 19th patient at the research hospital to contract an antibiotic-resistant strain of the bacterium Klebsiella pneumoniae that arrived in August 2011 with a New York woman who needed a lung transplant. But his case marked the first new infection of this superbug at NIH since January — a worrisome signal that the bug persists inside the huge brick-and-glass federal facility in Bethesda.
...Genetic analysis showed the boy’s strain matched that of the superbug that arrived last year. It eventually spread to 17 additional patients, of whom 11 died. Six of those deaths were directly attributed to the superbug by NIH staff. The NIH did not make the outbreak public until describing it in a scientific publication last month.
As the superbug spread last fall, NIH staff members built a wall to isolate infected patients, ripped out plumbing that harbored the bacteria, hired monitors to ensure doctors and nurses were properly scrubbing their hands and even blasted patients’ rooms with vaporized disinfectant.
By January, those measures had apparently halted the spread. For six months, no new patients became infected.
But in July, the boy tested positive for the superbug. Clinic staffers isolated him in the intensive-care unit and raced to treat the infection.......
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
So , if I interpret the statistics correctly, there is a 2/3rds mortality rate ; a 1/3 survival rate ?
And this disease has no control medications ..
When was the NIH going to release this information ?
Keep your hand sanitizer close by and use it.
Thank goodness they had a recent publication date.
Don’t forget that most ‘hand sanitizers’ use an alcohol base as a bacteriocide . My understanding is that alcohol bacteriocides need 2 minute exposure to kill all the bacteria.
I have yet to see any nurse , or doctor , scrub their hands for 2 minutes when entering , or exiting a patients room .
Thank goodness the publication of the clinicians report wasn’t delayed awaiting a later date to inform the public.
My understanding is that most ‘hand sanitizers’ use an alcohol base as a bacteriocide. Alcohol requires a two (2)minute exposure to kill bacteria.
When was the last time you saw a doctor or nurse scrub their hands for two (2) minutes when entering or leaving a patient’s room ? I am concerned ...
“....When was the last time you saw a doctor or nurse scrub their hands for two (2) minutes when entering or leaving a patient’s room ? I am concerned ...”
Let alone this....
“As the superbug spread last fall, NIH staff members built a wall to isolate infected patients, ripped out plumbing that harbored the bacteria, hired monitors to ensure doctors and nurses were properly scrubbing their hands and even blasted patients’ rooms with vaporized disinfectant.
So, have there been any ‘revivals’ of the recently deceased victims yet? Because that’s all we need for this to become a bad zombie movie.
We should start setting up sick rooms in our homes, since that is likely safer for ill loved ones than the hospital.
FYI, the kid had had a bone marrow transplant. He was not well to begin with. I feel bad for the child and his family.
That just isn't a very good cleanliness score, although one was at a different hospital.
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