The Association for Professionals in Infection Control and Epidemiology (APIC) has announced that it has put together an extensive summary of states that have a statewide issue with carbapenem-resistant Enterobacteriaceae (CRE), also known as the "superbug," according to an article on HealthTechZone.com.
The Center of Disease Control and Prevention has placed this 'superbug' in the urgent category in its Antibiotics Resistance Threats Report. The CDC report says untreatable and hard-to-treat infections from CRE are on the rise in patients across the United States. So far 44 states have confirmed cases. The APIC report breaks down how each state is handling CRE.
Read the report.
CRE has become resistant to almost all available antibiotics and can transfer their resistance from one organism to another. Reports show that close to half of all CRE-related bloodstream infections rare fatal, according to the article.
CRE was found in 1.2 percent of hospitals in the country in 2001. By 2011 and the first six months of 2012, it was found in 4.6 percent of acute care hospitals. In long-term care hospitals, the numbers have reached 18 percent. In all, CRE has been discovered in hospitals in 42 states, the article said
Read the article.