The daily Provence reports an infection which has been raging for several months in health establishments in Marseille. Caused by the bacterium Clostridium difficile, it was reported last March by the bacteriology laboratory of Timone. Four months later, three of the ten patients who had been identified in different hospital services in Marseille died.
While the Regional Health Agency (ARS) ensures on a daily basis that “the necessary protective and hygienic measures have been taken”, and that “the foci of infection are extinguished”, the germ would continue to be transmitted by contact fecal-oral (stool to the mouth) and at least six new cases have been identified in retirement homes in Marseille, indicates Provence.
Clostridium difficile bacteria cause severe diarrheal infections usually associated with the use of antibiotics. Well known in the United States, it is responsible for approximately 250,000 hospitalizations and at least 14,000 deaths each year.
According to the US Federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, those most at risk are older adults who take antibiotics and seek medical attention. “In one hospital, 30% of adults who developed diarrhea while being treated tested positive for Clostridium difficile,” they said in a report released last September.
Something to worry some specialists, who recommend in the columns of Provence “total isolation of patients in appropriate units” in order to stem the epidemic.
