Dr Michael Mulvey (R), Chief of Antimicrobial Resistance and Nosocomial Infections and biologist Tim Du check C Diff cell growth at the National Microbiology Laboratory in Winnipeg. (JOHN WOODS PHOTO FOR POSTMEDIA NEWS)
Published November 12, 2013
Ronald Hale was admitted to Edmonton’s Royal Alexandra Hospital with complications following lung surgery. The 74-year-old retired mine manager died days later, his body overwhelmed by a nightmarish bacterium from half a world away.
An Alberta woman, who had been in a rickshaw accident in India, had carried the microbe home and it got loose in the Royal Alex. Hale became infected and died when he could not fight off the microbe, which has acquired the biochemical machinery to evade nearly all antibiotics on the shelf.
While still rare in Canada, Britain and the U.S. are both struggling to contain these alarming microbes, which could spell the end of the antibiotic miracle.
Leading health officials are warning of a “catastrophic” threat, and Canadian doctors are calling for action to prevent the organisms from taking hold here.
Margaret Munro 