On 21 May, Public Health England (PHE) reported that a retrospective investigation identified 13 patients with endocarditis, surgical site infection or disseminated infection with Mycobacterium chimaera or other Mycobacterium avium complex (MAC) species within four years of surgery involving cardiopulmorary bypass.
Since December 2013 and as of 21 September 2014, WHO reports 6 262 cases of Ebola virus disease (EVD), including 2 917 deaths, in Guinea, Liberia, Nigeria and Sierra Leone. This is the first outbreak of EVD in West Africa and it is unprecedented in size and geographical distribution, affecting densely populated urban areas.
Since the last epidemiological update on Ebola virus disease (EVD) published on 9 January 2015, and as of 12 January 2015, WHO has reported 357 additional cases in the affected countries and 185 additional deaths.
Today, ECDC’s Healthcare-associated Infections Surveillance Network (HAI-Net) publishes two updated protocols for the surveillance of healthcare-associated infections (HAIs): one for surgical site infections (SSIs) and prevention indicators, and another one for HAIs and prevention indicators in intensive care units (ICUs), both to be used by European hospitals. An update of the protocol for the surveillance of Clostridium difficile infections (CDIs) was published on 21 April.
ECDC point prevalence surveys (PPSs) estimate that each year 3.5 million healthcare-associated infections occur in acute care hospitals, and 4.2 million in long-term care facilities (LTCFs) across Europe.
An EU-wide survey estimated that 4.2 million healthcare-associated infections occur every year in European long-term care facilities, compared to an estimated 3.5 million occurring in European acute care hospitals, and that on any given day, over 116 400 residents have at least one active healthcare-associated infection. Pete Kinross, an expert in surveillance of healthcare-associated infections at the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC), speaks about these findings during a session on antimicrobial resistance in these healthcare settings, at ECCMID 2017.
There has been a statistically significant increasing trend of listeriosis between 2008 and 2015, with the proportion of cases in the over 64 age group steadily increasing from 56.2% in 2008 to 64.1% in 2015.
The findings in the latest report on antimicrobial resistance (AMR) in bacteria from ECDC and EFSA underline the serious threat AMR poses to public and animal health. Infections caused by bacteria that are resistant to antimicrobials lead to about 25 000 deaths in the EU every year.
The global rise of carbapenemase-producing Enterobacteriaceae (CPE) is alarming and is an increasing threat to patient safety, in Europe and globally.