According to a government research, a drug-resistant and potentially lethal fungus is quickly spreading through US health facilities.
The fungus, a form of yeast called Candida auris or C. auris, can cause serious sickness in those with compromised immune systems, according to researchers from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
Since the fungus was first detected in the United States in 2016, the number of persons diagnosed, as well as those determined to be carrying C. auris through screening, has been increasing at an alarming rate.
The fungus was discovered in Asia in 2009, but experts believe it first appeared around the world approximately a decade earlier.
Dr. Meghan Lyman, chief medical officer of the CDC’s mycotic diseases department, said the increases are “particularly troubling to us in recent years.”
“We’ve witnessed increases not only in existing transmission regions, but also in new places,” she said.
Dr. Lyman also expressed concern about the growing amount of fungal samples that are resistant to standard therapies.
The fungus is “worrisome,” according to Dr Waleed Javaid, an epidemiologist and director of infection prevention and control at Mount Sinai Downtown in New York.
“But we don’t want people who saw ‘The Last of Us’ to believe we’re all going to die,” Dr Javaid explained.
“This is an infection that arises in severely ill people who are usually afflicted with a variety of other problems.”
The fungus, which can be found on the skin and throughout the body, poses little risk to healthy individuals.
Yet, around one-third of those infected with C. auris die.
The fungus has been found in more than half of the states in the United States. From 2020 and 2021, the number of illnesses in the United States grew by 95%.
The new study comes as Mississippi is dealing with an increasing outbreak of the fungus.
According to the state’s health agency, 12 people have been infected in the state since November, with four “possibly linked deaths.”
