Matheson Introduces Bill to Fight Drug Resistant Bacteria

Feb 25, 2008 by Eric Ray

(KCPW News) Bacteria once thought only to exist in hospitals has made its way into the community. These bacteria are becoming increasingly drug resistant, causing concern to build amongst the medical and political communities.

"Somewhere in the last 7 to 10 years we believe the resistance genes moved into some of the staph that are better suited to causing infections in the community," says Dr. Andrew Pavia, an epidemiologist at Primary Children's Medical Center. "So you then had the evolution of a bug that was well suited to circulate in the community and was resistant."

Pavia says drug companies aren't creating the antibiotics needed to fight resistant bacteria. He adds it's not known how widespread the problem is because states aren't required to track the illnesses caused by these so called "superbugs." Utah Congressman Jim Matheson has introduced legislation that attempts to change that.

"It's going to create far greater coordination and data collection so that across this country we can track this issue and try to make progress on it," says Matheson. "It's going to establish demonstration projects to encourage more responsible use of existing antibiotics. It's really going to create a joint blueprint for research between the National Institute of Health and the Centers for Disease Prevention."

The CDC estimates that there were more than 94,000 infections caused by these "superbugs" in 1995. Those infections were associated with more than 18,000 deaths. Matheson expects action to be taken on his bill in March.

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