Antibiotics and Superbugs: Recent Outbreak Highlights Dangers

An outbreak of a “superbug” at the Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center has left two dead and more than 170 exposed to the deadly bacteria that’s resistant to strong antibiotics. Medical devices used in endoscopic procedures were found to be housing the superbug carbapenem-resistant Enterobacteriaceae (CRE). CRE produces an enzyme called New Delhi metallo-beta-lactamase, or NDM, that eliminates the effectiveness of antibiotics. Researchers from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found that the endoscopes had not been properly sanitized, even though they had gone through a thorough disinfection process. The NDM-producing CRE bacteria was still present on the endoscopes after following the manufacturer’s directed cleaning procedure. A superbug is a strain of bacteria that’s heavily resistant to different types of antibiotics. The CDC estimates that 23,000 people are killed and over two million people are affected by superbugs each year. The rise of these statistics in
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