USA authorities said Tuesday they are establishing a network of labs that can respond quickly to antibiotic-resistant “superbugs”, following America’s first human case of a risky strain of E. coli.
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The CDC says it is working to enhance the capacity of regional and state labs to detect and respond to human cases of resistant pathogens.
With a total $21 million for the eight labs, the CDC will equip existing labs at hospitals and universities with devices and other infrastructure to receive suspected samples from other labs, according to Beth Bell, director of CDC National Center for Emerging and Zoonotic Infectious Diseases.
Healthcare providers and the public must play their part in combating the grave reality of antibiotic resistance and help preserve the effectiveness of antibiotics. “And that raises the risk that a pan-resistant bacteria could develop”, says Bell. The labs also will have access to a shared bank of samples to further research. “We are a globally interconnected world and people and bacteria travel around the globe”. “What we have to do is detect faster, strengthen our prevention strategies, and be very, very quick on controlling outbreaks when they’re identified”.
The CDC, for its part, has had this bug on its radar since a case emerged in China a year ago. Bacteria, even antibiotic resistant ones, are a fact of life. US officials have been hunting for it since November, she said, after Chinese and British researchers reported finding the colistin-resistant strain in pigs and raw pork and in a small number of people in China. She and other experts have said the best way people can protect themselves against antibiotic-resistant bacteria is to cook food completely and wash hands carefully, especially after handling anything that might be contaminated.
“The risk to the public at this point is pretty much minimal”, she said.
“I think it’s fair to characterize this as the scientists are sounding the alarm”, Miller said, “but this is something we should all be concerned about”.
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In the worst-case scenario, McGaan said, a bacteria that is already resistant to other antibiotics will acquire the mcr-1 gene, making it a “nightmare bacteria” that resists all antibiotics.
