See following article By - Sarah Wiedersehn SYDNEY, Jan 17 AAP -...

See following article By - Sarah Wiedersehn

SYDNEY, Jan 17 AAP - A family of drug-resistant and potentially deadly bacteria may be

spreading more widely and with increasing stealth than previously thought, US researchers

have warned.

Researchers at Harvard's T.H. Chan School of Public Health examined antibiotic

resistant Enterobacteriaceae (CRE) - a large family of bacteria that includes many of the

more familiar pathogens such as Salmonella - found to be causing disease in four US

hospitals.

They found a wide variety of CRE species as well as a wide variety of genetic traits

enabling the bacteria to resist antibiotics.

The findings of the study, published in the journal PNAS (Proceedings of the National

Academy of Sciences) suggest that CRE is more widespread than previously thought, and may

well be transmitting from person to person undetected because it shows no symptoms.

This has led to a call from the researchers for greater surveillance of the dangerous

bacteria.

"While the typical focus has been on treating sick patients with CRE-related

infections, our new findings suggest that CRE is spreading beyond the obvious cases of

disease," said William Hanage, associate professor of epidemiology at Harvard Chan School

and senior author of the study.

"We need to look harder for this unobserved transmission within our communities and

healthcare facilities if we want to stamp it out."

CRE are a class of bacteria resistant to multiple antibiotics, including carbapenems,

which are considered last-resort drugs when other antibiotics have failed.

The bacteria tend to spread in hospitals and long-term care facilities, causing

thousands of infections and even death each year.

According to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the incidence of

infections caused by CRE is on the rise.

CDC Director Tom Frieden has called them 'nightmare bacteria' because they are

resistant to some of the last-ditch treatments available to doctors battling resistant

infections.

The CDC this week said a superbug resistant to every available antibiotic recently

killed a woman in Reno, Nevada.

The woman, who had returned from India shortly before falling ill, died in September

after 26 different antibiotics failed to cure her infection. CRE is on the rise!

AAP sw/psm