MRSA - More deaths Spain - serious outbreak 250 infected - intensive care unit demolished


Pat's Note: the refusal of Defra to tell us whether British pigs have
MRSA, like so many abroad, is increasingly puzzling.

They must realise the implications of blocking release of the data,
not just in Britain, but oveseas.


http://afp.google.com/article/ALeqM5gMNgXwXzU4PjsD2rpxW_UEHlxgEw


Deadly bacteria kills 18 at major Madrid hospital


29 minutes ago

MADRID (AFP) ? Authorities in Spain launched Sunday an investigation
into the deaths of at least 18 people in a reported bacteria epidemic
at one of Madrid's main hospitals.

Deputy Prime Minister Maria Teresa Fernandez de la Vega, who was on an
official visit to Niger, announced a probe into what she described
as-- "a very, very serious incident" at the 12th October University
Hospital.


El Pais reported that at least 18 people had died in a bacteria
epidemic that infected more than 250 patients over a period of 20
months at the hospital.

The deaths were caused by Acinetobacter baumannii, a highly virulent
hospital-acquired infection that has strains that are resistant to
most drugs, the daily reported.

The situation was so bad at the hospital that the intensive care unit
had to be destroyed so that a new, non-contaminated structure could be
built, the report said.

The hospital's director, Joaquin Martinez, denied at a press
conference alongside his preventative medicine chief Jose Ramon de
Juanes that 18 deaths were directly caused by the bacterial infection.

Patients in a critical state "die from their illness, accompanied
exceptionally by an infection of multi-drug resistant Acinetobacter
baumannii and other types of micro-organisms, because they are more
vulnerable due to their health problems," said Juanes.

According to El Pais, the bacterium infected a total of 252 patients
between February 2006 and its eradication 20 months later.

More than 100 of those patients died, although only 18 of them
directly from this infection, the report said.

The bacterium "contributed to the death" of other patients but "had
not been the determining factor," Juan Carlos Montejo, a doctor at the
hospital, was quoted as saying by El Pais.

A similar so-called nosocomial infection -- Methicillin Resistant
Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) -- has been at the centre of a global
scare surrounding bacteria that are impervious to all but a handful of
antibiotics.

The European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control warned last
year that "healthcare-associated infections" such as MRSA and
Acinetobacter baumannii, are "possibly the biggest infectious disease
challenge facing the EU."

Acinetobacter baumannii tends to infect those in intensive care with
fragile immune systems and can lead quickly to pneumonia. It is easily
transmitted from hospital equipment or from patient to patient.

It led to the death of around 20 people in a several hospitals in
northern France in 2003.

--
Regards
Pat Gardiner
Release the results of testing British pigs for MRSA and C.Diff now!
www.go-self-sufficient.com

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