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Thursday 27 January 2011

Pigs, pork and C.Diff, investigations begin

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The writer has publicly written about human C.Diff being linked to pigs for years. constantly mentioning Canada, as well as Britain, and this particular newspaper as being close to, but shying off, exposing the link.

Literally thousands of postings, over years, have been made all over the Internet pleading for action. The human death toll, misery and the costs to the hospitals have been massive every year.

His signature on the Internet has included C.Diff for about five years:

"Release and independently audit the results of testing British pigs for MRSA, C.Diff and Hepatitis E now!"

Britain too, has had many deaths in hospitals especially in pig producing areas.

Few dare suggest that pig farming might be to blame for anything in pig country. Nobody will research possible links, least of all Britain’s corrupt government veterinarians.

Now this morning, a famous name, Weese, and the “Hamilton Spectator” publicly suggesting a possible connection.

Yippee! It’s a good day. They do not come too often in a world careless of human life and riddled with organised deception and veterinary crime.

Link to full article in the Hamilton Spectator


Sleuthing superbugs


It’s called community-acquired Clostridium difficile, and it has scientists working overtime to find out why a strain of the potentially deadly bacterium is circulating so quickly outside health-care settings – with some researchers speculating the superbug is being spread in food.


One of the most virulent of the infections that threaten the lives of in-patients who are elderly or immunocompromised, C. diff is a new priority because it’s showing up more frequently in people who’ve never been in hospital.


Infection specialists have been able to batten down against C. diff in hospitals in the past few years, even though the bug remains hard to control in health-care settings. But as in-patient safety has improved, there’s been a sharp rise in cases in the general community, including in children and pregnant women.


“It used to be we only worried about these infections in the hospital setting,” said Dr. Doug Sider, an Ontario government health protection specialist.


So far, researchers cannot find a clear answer to how C. diff is spreading so persistently through the general population – infecting younger, healthier people with less severe but still threatening diarrheal infections. Current studies are preliminary at best. ...

...“This could well be associated with food-borne transmission … or there could be other factors. This is why we need a better handle on what’s happening.”


Research at the University of Guelph has linked veterinary science with food-safety expertise to track why the gastrointestinal superbug has moved into people with none of the classic risks. Certain antibiotics and hospital procedures such as bowel surgery are among factors that change the flora of the intestinal tract, making it possible for C. diff spores to activate and release toxins that cause severe diarrhea and sometimes death.


“It’s showing up in people who have contracted C. diff without being exposed to clinical environments or received antibiotic treatment,” said Keith Warriner, associate professor in food science at the University of Guelph. “We’re finding there’s been a steady increase in this. Is it something to do with the immune system, with stress? Is it something else?”


He and Scott Weese, a pathobiology specialist at the university’s veterinary college, are trying to establish whether the strain associated with community-acquired C. diff is spread through the food chain, or the general environment, for example through water.


Weese has found C. diff in pig manure and on pork but no firm link has been established to food. One possibility is that spores are in sludge spread on fields, and leaking into water, but no one is certain yet, Warriner said.


“People are looking at C. diff more now,” he added. “It’s a pathogen we clearly need to control. It kills 25,000 a year in North America.” ...


...Younger patients, less severe infections


As more information accumulates, hospitals are reporting that patients whose C. diff was contracted in the community are younger than the elderly people who normally succumb. Infections in pregnant women are also more common. A study published this month in the Archives of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine showed the number of hospitalized children infected by the superbug rose 15 per cent a year between 1997 and 2006 in the United States. Other research shows that those with strong immune systems tend to ward off the infection more aggressively than the elderly. Some infected patients have no symptoms, but others develop toxic diarrhea, perforated bowels or other potentially fatal complications....
...Zo-o-no-what?


The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in the United States is collaborating with experts in food safety and veterinary medicine to answer a major question facing public health regulators: Is C. diff an emerging zoonosis? That’s the term used for an infectious disease in animals that can be transmitted to people. University of Guelph researchers Keith Warriner and Scott Weese are one of many teams exploring the troubling theory that C. diff could be food-borne. Researchers at the CDC, one of the world’s pre-eminent human health agencies, say that while there is no proof that people can get the superbug from food, there’s also no confirmed evidence that they cannot. ...