Maintain pressure on reforms to protect NHSMRSA tracked with DNA mapping
Scientists in Britain have developed a genetic method of tracking how MRSA is spread.
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The Cambridge-based scientists were able to track patient-to-patient MRSA transmission after using DNA mapping technology to investigate the bacteria’s genome.
It is thought that the new technique will help scientists monitor whether the bacteria is being spread within hospitals or is coming in from the outside.
The team also suggested that MRSA emerged in Europe as antibiotics were being rolled-out for the first time in the 1960s.
Scientists at the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute in Hinxton published their research in the journal Science.
Co-author Dr Sharon Peacock, from Cambridge University, said: “Our research should inform global surveillance strategies to track the spread of MRSA.
“The implications for public health are clear: this technology represents the potential to trace transmission pathways of MRSA more definitively so that interventions or treatments can be targeted with precision and according to need.”
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Readers' comments (1)
Anonymous | 22-Jan-2010 1:58 pm
I would like to point out that MRSA is not, in fact, a virus and this error does not show nursing in a good light if it is thought that we cannot even differentiate between different groups or micro-organisms
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