The number of infections with microscopic fungus Candida auris would multiply discreetly around the world. And this, in a climate of secrecy, alert him New York Times in a long article on this mysterious, stubborn and deadly infection. The germ, known to researchers since 2009, attacks people whose weakened immune system – infants, the elderly, smokers, people with an autoimmune disease or even diabetics.
Most importantly, it is resistant to most antifungal drugs (that is, against infections caused by microscopic fungi and yeasts). “In short, fungi, like bacteria, create new defenses to survive today’s drugs”, summarizes the American daily. A situation which again illustrates thedisturbing development of superbugs, linked to the overuse of antibiotics.
Many cases recorded
the New York Times thus relates the many times when Candida auris has struck for the past five years, without causing any reaction from public health experts. In 2016, the Royal Brompton Hospital in London, a prestigious British medical center, had to close its intensive care unit for ten days for decontamination. Between 2016 and 2017, 372 people were infected in a hospital in Valencia, Spain. A neonatal unit was also affected in Venezuela. In 2018, a man even died at Mount Sinai Hospital in New York after being tested positive and placed in quarantine.
“The symptoms – fever, body aches and fatigue – are apparently ordinary, but when an infected person is already in poor health, such common symptoms can be fatal.”, recalls the newspaper. However, in each situation cited, the authors of the article deplore that public communication has not been undertaken. “According to health professionals, revealing the existence of epidemics frightens patients, who are powerless, all the more so when the risks remain unclear”, they explain.
A risk that could spread if nothing is done
A study published in the journal Emerging Infectious Diseases last year looked at 51 cases of infection by the fungus, declared in New York establishments between 2013 and 2017. All infected patients already had health problems. After testing positive for the germ, nearly half died within 90 days. A total of 98% of the samples tested were resistant to fluconazole, a commonly used antifungal drug.
The recent exhibition of Candida auris, or other germs like Aspergillus fumigatus, is another example of what the World Health Organization (WHO) considers to be one of the ten most important threats in the world: resurgence of drug resistance infections, linked to overconsumption of antibiotics.
Because if these contaminations are for the moment fatal for weakened individuals, the risk could in the future extend to healthy people. According to one UK government funded study and relayed by the New-York Times, “10 million people in the world could die from all these infections in 2050” if nothing is done to fix it.
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