Superbug Fungus Spreading in 2 US Cities

CDC says drug-resistant 'Candida auris' is moving from person to person in Dallas and DC
By Newser Editors and Wire Services
Posted Jul 23, 2021 7:25 AM CDT
Superbug Fungus Spreading in 2 US Cities
This 2016 photo shows a strain of Candida auris cultured in a petri dish at a CDC laboratory.   (Shawn Lockhart/CDC via AP)

US health officials said Thursday they now have evidence of an untreatable fungus spreading in two hospitals and a nursing home, per the AP. The "superbug" outbreaks were reported in a Washington, DC, nursing home and at two Dallas-area hospitals, the CDC reported. A handful of the patients had fungal infections that were impervious to all three major classes of medications. "This is really the first time we've started seeing clustering of resistance" in which patients seemed to be getting the infections from each other, said the CDC's Dr. Meghan Lyman. The fungus, Candida auris, is a harmful form of yeast that is considered dangerous to hospital and nursing home patients with serious medical problems. Outbreaks in health care facilities have been spurred when the fungus spread through patient contact or on contaminated surfaces.

Health officials have sounded alarms for years about the superbug after seeing infections in which commonly used drugs had little effect. In 2019, doctors diagnosed three cases in New York that were also resistant to a class of drugs, called echinocandins, that were considered a last line of defense. In those cases, there was no evidence the infections had spread from patient to patient—scientists concluded the resistance to the drugs formed during treatment. The new cases did spread, the CDC concluded. In Washington, DC, a cluster of 101 C. auris cases at a nursing home included three that were resistant to all three kinds of antifungal medications. A cluster of 22 in two Dallas-area hospitals included two with that level of resistance. Of the five people who were fully resistant to treatment, two in Texas and one in Washington died. (The fungus was found in a natural environment for the first time.)

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