Florida Personal Injury and Wrongful Death Blog

Wrongful Death Lawyer | Clearwater | St. Petersburg | MRSA a Super Staph Infection

If you've never paid attention to MRSA you should start doing so. What is it? MRSA is a type of super staph infection,  resistant to most antibiotics, technically it means methicillin resistant staphylococcus aureus.   It is a growing problem which threatens the health and safety of us all.

These superbugs became "super " because of the adaptive ability of the staph bug which carries infection. They mutate and change. As antibiotics were developed to combat the bugs they were largely effective in killing them. But the bugs continued to mutate to resist the latest antibiotic. The problem has been compounded by decades of over use of antibiotics by doctors proddled by patients to give them something when they were sick.  What harm could it cause? Apparently, quite a bit of harm over a long period of time.

Add to the mix the inability of the pharmaceutical companies to continue to develop big new antibiotics capable of stopping the mutating bugs. As a result, there are now superbugs for which there is no antibiotic. Contracting such a bug can be fatal.

It is common knowledge that MRSA bugs exist in hospitals. The very place most of us would assume we should be safe. Hospital stays are minimized, in part, to reduce exposure to these bugs by getting the patient out as quickly as possible.

The St. Petersburg Times had a strong editorial on April 8, 2009 about the growing problem these  bugs are causing in athletic facilities of the NFL, as well as high school gyms. Lawyers USA, March 2009, reported a verdict in Dallas recently which awarded $17.5 million in damages to someone who lost all his limbs from hospital acquired MRSA infection. Physicians were sued for failing to timely diagnose the infection and begin treatment. Costs of future medical care for this man was projected to be astronomical. While this case is an eyecatching extreme example, we all must be mindful of the growing threat these bugs have been. Parents, in particular, must become more educated about infections invading locker rooms and gymns, and know signs and symptoms of resistant infection and be assertive in pursuing diagnosis and treatment.