Washington health officials investigate first case of drug-resistant fungus in Pierce County man
Washington health officials stated they had been investigating the first case of Candida auris, or C. auris, identified in the state.
A Pierce County man was identified with colonization because of the multidrug-resistant fungus on July 13.
The man examined constructive at Kindred Hospital Seattle–First Hill throughout an admission screening.
Before that, he had been a affected person at St. Joseph Medical Center in Tacoma for about six weeks.
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Candida auris is a yeast accountable for many infections. Resistant to most antifungal medication, this fungus causes deaths worldwide. (BSIP/Education Images/Universal Images Group through Getty Images)
He suffers from a number of comorbidities and has not lately traveled out of state.
The Tacoma-Pierce County Health Department stated that is believed to be the first regionally acquired case in Washington.
The Washington State Department of Health issued a health alert about this case on Tuesday.
“Screening for contagious diseases helps healthcare and public health find infections early to help limit spread. It is a critical step to protect the public,” Nigel Turner, Division Director for Communicable Disease Control, stated in an announcement. “We prepare for this and other diseases to make sure we and our healthcare partners can respond quickly and effectively.”
The director of the National Reference Centre for Invasive Fungus Infections, Oliver Kurzai, holding in his palms a petri dish containing the yeast candida auris in a laboratory of Wuerzburg University in Wuerzburg, Germany, on January 23, 2018. (Photo by Nicolas Armer/image alliance through Getty Images)
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The Tacoma-Pierce County Health Department is working with the State Department of Health, Public Health Seattle-King County, Virginia Mason Franciscan Health and Kindred Hospitals to investigate.
“We will provide testing for other patients who may have been exposed. This patient will remain isolated while he continues to receive care,” it stated in a launch Tuesday.
C. auris is a kind of yeast that may trigger extreme sickness, particularly in these affected by critical medical situations who’ve frolicked in hospitals.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) headquarters in Atlanta, Georgia. (Elijah Nouvelage/Bloomberg through Getty Images)
Patients who’re colonized can carry and unfold C. auris even when it isn’t making them sick.
From 2013 via final 12 months, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported 5,654 infections of C. auris throughout the nation, together with in western states.
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The company says that the chance of C. auris an infection to in any other case wholesome individuals, together with healthcare personnel, is extraordinarily low.
The fungus may cause critical infections in the blood and wounds. More than one in three sufferers with C. auris an infection dies.
