CNN reporting staph infections affecting Fencers

[jesup]

There's an anti-biotic-resistant (not all, just one) staph infection affecting (among 4 others) fencers.

Normally it's spread by contact (such as in Football) and skin breaks. Apparently in fencing (they mentioned this) it's spread by sharing body cords.

There's a CDC release about this. Sanjay Gupta was talking about it on CNN.

[mfp]

Fencing.net (and the AP and Yahoo) scooped CNN on this story two months ago:

http://www.fencing101.com/vb/showthr...&threadid=7843

Or perhaps it's just a slow news day at CNN

The original release from the CDC can be found at:

http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/mm5233a4.htm

[picojeff]

Interesting to note that the CDC recommends showering (and using a clean towel) after practice and competitions, and that the club provide a clean facility to make that possible. How many clubs in the country have a shower at all? Maybe 10%? We consider ourselves somewhat refined in our sport, but we don't even take basic steps to ensure good hygiene. Who hasn't gone straight from practice or a tournament to a restaurant, without showering? No wonder we're lumped in with football in a CDC report on transmitting infectious disease.

Does your club have a shower? How many clubs in your area have a shower? College facilities are much more likely to have them. Of non-collegiate clubs I have been to in the US, less than one in ten has had a shower.