MRSA and poor neighborhoods

A fascinating study in this week's Archives of Internal Medicine [Arch Intern Med. 2007;167:1026-1033] identifies an increase of Community Acquired MRSA (a different clonal entity from hospital acquired MRSA) from 24.0 cases per 100 000 people in 2000 to 164.2 cases per 100 000 people in 2005 (relative risk, 6.84 [2005 vs 2000]). This infection has emerged among Chicago’s urban poor. It has occurred in addition to, not in place of, methicillin-susceptible S aureus infection.