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California State Senator Introduces Bill That Would Mandate Reporting of 'Superbug' Infections, Deaths (reuters.com)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Reuters: A California state senator introduced a bill on Monday that would mandate reporting of antibiotic-resistant infections and deaths and require doctors to record the infections on death certificates when they are a cause of death. The legislation also aims to establish the nation's most comprehensive statewide surveillance system to track infections and deaths from drug-resistant pathogens. Data from death certificates would be used to help compile an annual state report on superbug infections and related deaths. In September, a Reuters investigation revealed that tens of thousands of superbug deaths nationwide go uncounted every year. The infections are often omitted from death certificates, and even when they are recorded, they aren't counted because of the lack of a unified national surveillance system. Because there is no federal surveillance system, monitoring of superbug infections and deaths falls to the states. A Reuters survey of all 50 state health departments and the District of Columbia found that reporting requirements vary widely. Hill's bill would require hospitals and clinical labs to submit an annual summary of antibiotic-resistant infections to the California Department of Health beginning July 1, 2018; amend a law governing death certificates by requiring that doctors specify on death certificates when a superbug was the leading or a contributing cause of death; and require the state Health Department to publish an annual report on resistant infections and deaths, including data culled from death certificates.
I mean seriously? Do you not have a mandated system of reporting super bugs, infectious disease breakouts, and other nasties?
"superbug" is not a medical term, neither is "other nasties". The first is sensationalist journalist's term, the second came out of your ass. If the language on the bill contains the word "superbug" the senator should be intravenously fed goat shit.
Proving that death was indeed caused by a multi-drug resistant strain is not trivial in many cases, the testing for that post-mortem would need technical standards that are not always agreed upon
Let's be completely honest here: overprescribing of antibiotics by physicians, especially when a patient obviously has a virus for which an antibiotic is useless, is partially to blame for the widespread prevalence of MR bugs. Use of specialized, last-resort antibiotics for routine infection is common.
The other factor is the unconscionable "prophylactic" use of antibiotics in farm animals to sustain flocks in overcrowded conditions and stimulate weight gain in cattle.
You, or someone you love, *will* develop an opportunistic, difficult to treat infection as a result of trying to keep beef and chicken prices low.
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