infection control

Last week, CDC Director Thomas Frieden opened a press briefing by saying, "It's not often that our scientists come to me to say that we have a very serious problem, and we need to sound an alarm." What scientists found, and reported in CDC's Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, is that a growing proportion of Enterobacteriaceae (a family of bacteria known for causing hospital-acquired infections) are resistant to carbapenems, a type of antibiotics that's typically been the last line of attack against stubborn infections. Frieden explained why these carbapenem-resistant Enterobacteriaceae (…
And you thought fixing the renminbi was bad. By way of Glyn Moody, we find that The Guardian has a very disturbing report about antibiotic resistance in China (italics mine): Chinese doctors routinely hand out multiple doses of antibiotics for simple maladies like the sore throats and the country's farmers excessive dependence on the drugs has tainted the food chain. Studies in China show a "frightening" increase in antibiotic-resistant bacteria such as staphylococcus aureus bacteria, also know as MRSA . There are warnings that new strains of antibiotic-resistant bugs will spread quickly…