Los Angeles County plans to require hospitals to begin reporting when patients are infected with a certain superbug so lethal that it can kill half its victims, health officials said Thursday. The county had stopped requiring hospitals to report CRE infections in 2012 “due to resource limitations,” according to officials, although some hospitals had continued to voluntarily submit bacterial samples from patients stricken with the superbug. Terashita said that the county does not plan to release the names of the hospitals reporting the CRE infections except in rare cases. And the county will not require hospitals to report whether patients with CRE die or survive, Terashita said. Since late 2014, CRE has caused three outbreaks at Los Angeles County hospitals, including at UCLA Ronald Reagan Medical Center, where three patients died.

Source: Los Angeles Times October 07, 2016 02:26 UTC