After participating in a night of barhopping with colleagues and a couple of patients, some 75 members of the Madrid-based hospital’s emergency response unit have been infected with a drug-resistant bacteria — known as a Carbapenem-resistant Enterobacteriaceae (CRE). The hospital is scrambling to treat more than 100 patients with potentially grave infections caused by the bacteria, including infants and cancer patients.
Clinic staff began feeling ill after the alcohol-free Christmas drinks following which their blood tested positive for CRE bacteria. A total of 77 workers are infected with the bacteria, the equivalent of between one in 10 and one in 15 employees, according to Spanish media. As the Health Ministry sent a letter to every medical professional, “working on isolation, many patients” have been tested for the infection.
According to experts, the hospital should have had a system in place to inspect and test people for the bacteria. In 2017, the Andalucian health department reported 110 new cases of the CRE bacteria. There is currently no cure for the bacteria, and the exact number of infection cases is unclear as many victims are too sick to disclose their diagnoses.
Read the full story at NBC News.
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