Igorance and MRSA - a deadly team

If you watched the news at all in the last week, you will probably have seen the media frenzy resulting from the latest "outbreak" of the danger methicillin-resistant staphylococcus aureus infection, more commonly known as MRSA. An entire school district in Virginia is in mourning after a student died after contracting the infection and schools across the country, including my home state of Connecticut, are suddenly reporting cases. What struck me as profoundly upsetting about this crisis is the ignorance of the media regarding MRSA and how it is contracted. To me this incident just shows that a large-scale communications effort must be undertaken by the government to inform the public about contagious diseases and how to prevent their spread.

This crisis could literally be washed away with soap and water. The germs are passed by contact, and while it is tragic that a 17 year old high school student passed away from the disease, his death could have been prevented if there were more information about the problem and how to prevent it. If he had just washed his hands more often or at the right moment, his life could have been saved. Yet he was unaware of the dangers he faced by forgetting to wash his hands or cover a scratch, and it cost him his life. More effort needs to be made to inform students that they need to wash their hands multiple times during the school day.

The most alarming result of his death is that the media seems to be placing blame for the student's death on the school system. While CNN hosted health experts who stressed over and over again the importance of maintaining good hygiene and washing your hands, the broadcasters concentrated on what they considered to be inferior efforts of the school system in Virginia to clean up the schools in the wake of the student's tragic death.

Cleaning the schools was simply an effort to put the minds of the students and their parents to rest. It will not prevent the spread of germs in an environment that is probably one of the most highly contagious imaginable. All the students crammed in together, sharing food and lockers and books, it is a theme park for deadly, contagious diseases like MRSA. And yet instead of making an effort to inform students how to prevent the spread of such diseases that killed their fellow student, they pretend to clean up the environment and give them a false sense of security.

The CDC needs to step in and take control of this issue by creating and implementing communications campaigns that teach students the importance of washing their hands and how diseases spread. Interviews with students aired on CNN show that students in the effected Virginia school district have no idea that it was not the school's fault that their friend died. They want to blame the school to help them cope with their loss, but more than that they have no reason not to blame the school because nobody has told them the truth about MRSA. They need to be informed, before more students fall victim to their own ignorance.

Sources:http://www.courant.com/news/local/hc-updated-superbug-1018,0,7903588.story?track=rss
http://www.cnn.com/2007/HEALTH/10/18/mrsa.cases/index.html?iref=newssearch
http://www.cnn.com/2007/HEALTH/conditions/10/16/staph.death.ap/index.html?iref=newssearch