MRSA as a Public Health Concern in Medical Facilities
What is MRSA and why does it present a unique threat to public health?
Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) is a type of staph infection that is especially resistant to a wide number of antibiotics, including methicillin, oxacillin, penicillin and amoxicillin. As with most multi-drug resistant pathogens, MRSA is difficult to combat once contracted because the normal regimen of drugs does not work. With the increased use of antibiotics, with a number of different pathogens there has been seen an increase in drug-resistant strains, such as with MRSA, Tuberculosis and [?]. Many credit the overuse of antibiotics as the main cause for this increase in resistance, but as is discussed below, there are a number of compounding factors. In addition to the resistant nature of MSRA, there has also been an observable increase in number of cases. A study done over the past seven years has shown a significant increase of MRSA in hospitals, from 4.5/10,000 in 2002 to 19/10,000 in 2009 . This is especially dangerous due to the fact that MRSA frequently presents itself in hospital environments, where there is a significantly more vulnerable population than the general public, which combined with the fact that nearly half of all in-patients and almost all intensive care unit patients are on some form of antibiotics leads to increased resistance to antibiotics. MRSA presents a unique threat to public health for a number of reasons. First and foremost, it reinforces the importance of maintaining a sterile and sanitary environment in hospital-settings to protect those that have open wounds, are immunosuppresed or have had their immune systems otherwise weakened. Second, MRSA has shown an increasing resistance [?] to nearly all forms of antibiotics, causing many to term it a ‘superbug’ because it has become increasingly difficult to combat. There is some light at the end of the tunnel, however. Many public health officials have pointed out how easy it is to protect against MRSA in hospital settings, mostly by maintaining standard sanitary procedures.
How did MRSA evolve in to the multi-drug resistant strain it is today?
Since the discovery of penicillin and other antibiotics, there was a significant period of time when antibiotics were viewed as ‘cure-alls’ for infection, and “there was a feeling of complacency between the 1940s-190s, with a misplaced belief that available antibiotics would always effectively treat all infections,” . However, the over-prescription of antibiotics, especially in cases where the person would have likely beat the infection on their own anyway, led to an increase in resistance to the normal regimen of antibiotics, most notably methicillin, oxacillin, penicillin and amoxicillin.
-Talk about people not following through on their drug therapies, allowing populations of bacteria to rebound, now resistant to that antibiotic
What are the public health recommendations for combating MRSA?
