US woman dies of infection resistant to all 26 antibiotics
A US woman has died from an infection that was resistant to all 26 available antibiotics, health officials said this week, raising new concerns about the rise of dangerous superbugs.
The woman, who was in her 70s, died in Nevada in September, and had recently been hospitalized in India with fractured leg bones, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported.
The cause of death was sepsis, following infection from a rare bacteria known as carbapenem-resistant Enterobacteriaceae (CRE), which is resistant to all antibiotics available in the United States.
The specific strain of CRE, known as Klebsiella pneumoniae, was isolated from one of her wounds in August.
Tests were negative for the mcr-1 gene -- a great concern to health experts because it makes bacteria resistant to the antibiotic of last resort, colistin.
Postmortem tests showed her infection might have responded to a treatment called fosfomycin, which is not approved in the United States.
Paul Hoskisson, a researcher at the University of Strathclyde, in Scotland, said that several European countries, including Britain, license fosfomycin for intravenous use in such cases.
"This is important because we are seeing increasing numbers of drug-resistant infections, and this is one of the first cases for Klebsiella where no drug options were open to the medical staff."
Multi-drug-resistant Klebsiella pneumoniae has been described by the World Health Organization as "an urgent threat to human health."
According to Nick Thomson, leader of the bacterial genomics and evolution group at the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute in England, this bacteria is likely to become more and more resistant.
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