Wednesday, October 17, 2007

May Exceed AIDS Death Toll
Super Bug Now in U.S.

90,000 Potential Victims

[photo:CNN]

Estimated to Kill More Than AIDS

by Mondoreb


Last week, Death by 1000 Papercuts reported on a "super bug" that's been killing hospital patients in the U.K. Now, news of the Super Bug's spread to the U.S.

From CNN:
More than 90,000 Americans get potentially deadly infections each year from a drug-resistant staph "superbug," the government reported Tuesday in its first overall estimate of invasive disease caused by the germ.

Deaths tied to these infections may exceed those caused by AIDS, said one public health expert commenting on the new study. The report shows just how far one form of the staph germ has spread beyond its traditional hospital setting.

The overall incidence rate was about 32 invasive infections per 100,000 people. That's an "astounding" figure, said an editorial in Wednesday's Journal of the American Medical Association, which published the study.
As we observed last week, Super Bug's not as catchy as the "brain-eating microbes" found in the Arizona lake last month, but it's starting to get our attention.

Digg!

Back to Front Page.

No comments:

Post a Comment

Leave your name/nic.
We've changed the comments section to allow non-registered users to comment.
We'll continue like that until it's being abused.
We reserve the right to delete all abusive or otherwise inappropriate comments.