The virus invades the beaches

According to a research doctor, you need to add MRSA virus to the list of issues to consider when going to the coast today.

To be safe in the water, you still need to bathe before and after swimming. But Staphylococcus aureus is antimicrobial, a bacterium that can cause staph infection to be hard to cure with anti-infection drugs such as methicillin, which can be invaded when you take a dip in seawater, Dr. Lisa Plano belonging to the University of Miami Miller Medical School.

MRSA means methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus. It has become a high-risk problem in hospitals in recent years.

'MRSA can exist in the country and in the sand,' Plano told a group of reporters at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. 'This is a risk for anyone who comes to the beach and uses water. Most of us are not infected but if only one person is infected, the disease will spread '.

Staphylococcus, a bacterium that reacts with antibiotics, is not a big problem in everyday life. About one-third of us have this bacterium that lives in the nose or on the skin, and we often aren't affected. But for children, the elderly and those with weakened immune systems, staph can cause life-threatening infections.

In any population, when people are infected with antibiotic-resistant bacteria, doctors often face a lot of difficulties in resolving this infection.

Both staph bacteria respond to antibiotics and MRSA (unresponsive) are problems in hospitals, but these bacteria have appeared in the locker rooms of perfectly healthy people, even There are rumors about infection in NFL and NBA athletes.

'Complex bacteria'.

Scientists already know that staph can spread in water. The Plano-directed study shows that MRSA is also found at beaches - in seawater and possibly in sand.

To investigate this issue, Plano and colleagues recently studied 1,300 adult swimmers at South Florida Beach, half of them soaked in water and brought back a sample of water to analyze the room. experiments, the other half sat on the beach for 15 minutes.

About 37% of seawater samples contain Staphylococcus aureus, and 3% of these are antibiotic-resistant bacteria, although this beach is not located near any waste source.

In other words, bacteria can come from the swimmers themselves. Staphylococcus is a mild type, but the MRSA type is very strong.

A strange thing is that Plano found that bacterial gene analysis in water samples showed very little occurrence of gene markers causing skin infections associated with staph.

Plano said in a phone interview with LiveScience: 'Staph is a very complicated bacteria. S. aureus has more than 40 different types of toxic accelerators that can use different types of infections, and not all staph bacteria have all of these properties. Basically, most staph bacteria have some toxic factors. What I observed and what I compared are the factors related to skin infections'.

Both in the sand

Public swimming pools and most private pools are usually safe for S. aureus if the chlorine concentration is adequate, Plano said.

But there is some evidence that staph bacteria spread in the sand. In one study, a number of staph-free seawater was poured into 14 children who had not been infected with staph and then played 10 minutes on the beach. The amount of water after flushing was collected and analyzed - some contained S. aureus.

'If they have MRSA on their skin, there may be MRSA in the sand,' Plano said. It is not clear whether staph and MRSA reproduce in seawater. She said: 'We know that MRSA can be isolated from marine mammals such as dolphins or seals, which suggests MRSA may still exist in the water,' but more research is needed. To find out how long this creature can survive in the water.

Measures: bath.

There is no reason to stay away from the beaches, but everyone should bathe before and after entering the water. And it is best not to go to the beach if you have open wounds.

Plano only wants people to be aware of the potential risks of S. aureus and MRSA at the beach.

She commented: 'This is a complicated issue. There is still a lot of work to do to understand the risk of exposure to Staph aureus at the beach. You should not be afraid of the beach. You should go to the beach and be happy. '

The research was funded by the National Science Foundation, the Florida Department of Health and Environment Protection, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Environmental Protection Agency.