Study warns of urgent need to address spread of new antibiotic resistant superbugs

RESEARCHERS have discovered three new strains of bacteria scaringly resistant to most antibiotics — and they say what hospitals do is to blame.

DOCTORS are warning Australians could be faced with incurable infections because of the rise of superbugs resistant to antibiotics — and they say hospitals are to blame.

Three new strains of superbug that are resistant to most antibiotics have been found in Australian hospitals, according to new research.

The bacteria, called staphylococcus epidermidis, are widely found on human skin, but these new strains are resistant to almost all antibiotics.

Researchers said most alarming was the discovery that some of the strains discovered in Europe were resistant to all known antibiotics.

And they are concerned that hospital practices may have driven the evolution of the once dormant bacteria towards potentially incurable infections.

They think the use of antibiotic impregnated medical devices such as catheters could one of the causes.

Researchers from the Doherty Institute looked at hundreds of bacteria samples from 78 institutions in 10 countries around the world.

Professor Ben Howden said the bug infected people who had compromised immune systems or had prosthetic materials implanted, such as catheters and joint replacements.

“The discovery of these new strains means we are now routinely using our last-line antibiotics that are expensive and toxic,” Prof Howden said. “This makes these infections very costly and difficult to treat.”

Researchers say the overuse of antibiotics in hospitals could be to blame for the new resistant bacteria strains spreading around the world.

Researchers discovered current treatments needed to be reviewed when they found the bacteria made a small change in its DNA that led to resistance to two major antibiotics.

Dr Jean Lee said the two antibiotics were unrelated so they did not expect one mutation to cause both antibiotics to fail.

“Our study suggests current guidelines for treating these infections with the combination of these two antibiotics that were thought to protect one another against developing resistance are based on an incorrect assumption, and that current treatment recommendations need to be reviewed,” Dr Lee said.

The researchers suggested the reason for the spread of these strains was likely two-fold.

They said implanted devices or catheters used with antibiotics as a strategy to prevent infection was likely promoting the development of resistance.

The second reason was the use of antibiotics in intensive care. They said the infections were most prevalent in intensive care where patients were sickest and strong antibiotics were liberally prescribed, promoting the development of additional resistance.

Prof Howden said the spread of these antibiotic-resistant strains highlighted the need to be more aware of this as a problem in our hospitals.

“There is an urgent need for an international monitoring system to understand the prevalence and impact of these trains and to systematically measure antibiotic resistance and infections due to this pathogen,” he said.

“We need a better understanding of how this bacteria is persisting in hospitals, because it’s happening in an era where MRSA (golden staph) is disappearing through good infection control measures.”