Multidrug-resistant bacteria: Second patient dies in Dresden-Neustadt hospital
Another patient infected with a multidrug-resistant bacterium has died in a Dresden hospital, according to an announcement by the Dresden-Neustadt Municipal Hospital. The patient had previously been treated with so-called reserve antibiotics.
Admitted to the hospital with severe illnesses
One patient had already died on Sunday—according to the hospital, due to a severe underlying illness. However, it remains unclear to what extent the multidrug-resistant pathogen contributed to the patient’s death due to the complexity of the illness. Both patients had been admitted to the hospital with severe pre-existing conditions.
Both patients passed away as a result of their severe underlying illnesses. Whether and to what extent the bacterium contributed to this is unknown.
Risk of bacterial spread increases
It became known a week ago that five patients on the new intensive care unit of the Dresden-Neustadt hospital had been affected by a multidrug-resistant bacterium. In the meantime, the pathogen has also been detected in a patient who had already been transferred from the intensive care unit. This patient is not ill but is under observation in the infectious disease ward. All affected individuals are being treated in isolation. The bacterium is particularly dangerous because it can pass its resistance on to similar, uncontaminated bacteria, says the hospital’s medical director, Dr. Lutz Blase.
According to our assessment, at least four percent of the approximately 18 million patients in Germany—amounting to 720,000 people—become infected with bacteria in the hospital. We suspect it is actually closer to five percent. That would be 900,000 infections.