[mewzilla]

I wasn't aware that MDR staph was that prevalent outside hospital settings.

[Judith Anne]

In a recent study in the UK, 8 of 1000 people in the general population were found to have it colonized in the front of the nose.

Now, just imagine a little old lady taking her purchase to the clerk, and while paying, takes a cloth handkerchief out of her coat pocket to blow her nose, then puts the hanky back in the pocket.

Does she wash her hands? No, she hasn't gone to the bathroom, she's just blown her nose.

Then she visits her friend in the hospital and gives her the nice gift she just bought.

Her friend in the hospital has the flu, for example. She takes the contaminated gift into her hands (lotion, for example) opens it, and smells the lotion. Nice. She also transfers the bug, hypothetically, to her own hands. She gets a fit of coughing, covers her mouth with her hands, and inhales the MRSA from her friend's nose.

Bingo! MRSA pneumonia! She acquired it IN the hospital, but not FROM the hospital.