D.C. Region Fights Antibiotic Resistant Staph Bacteria

(WUSA)- It often starts as a little scrape or cut - and it can metastasize into a raging infection that can kill you.

Hospitals across our region are battling an antibiotic resistant staph bacteria, disinfecting bedside Bibles and pouring through gallons of hand sanitizer.

This bug can nail even the healthiest people. Haymarket, Virginia Battlefield High School soccer standout Brendan Shaffer was about as fit as they come when the tiny staphylococcus bacteria nearly killed him.

"I guess I wasn't breathing. I was on oxygen for four days."

"I would go 'Brendan, you need to breath. Remember to breath,'" says his mother, Denise.

Brendan suspects what doctor's call methicillin-resistant staphylococcus aureus entered his body through his wounded, soccer battered feet. "It was really scary. I wasn't sure if I was going to live."

Brendan is far from alone. An estimated 17,000 people die from the infection every year.

When the Washington Redskins come in from practice, they enter a locker room newly remodeled to fight staph. The disease has tackled six Skins in the last few years.

Doctors say there a lot of people out there with no symptoms who may still be harboring the pathogen - and spreading it.

"Where once people associated staph outbreaks in healthcare, now we're seeing it going from the community into health care facilities," says Lucy Caldwell of the Virginia Department of Health.

Virginia launched a summit on the issue on Friday. "If you've got a wound that's not healing, talk to your health care provider, and possibly get it cultured so you can see what you're treating," says Caldwell.

Jeffrey Elting, MD, of the District of Columbia Hospital Association says his members "are really focusing on infection control procedures already."

DC Health Officials have a task force. They say the bug is probably with us to stay.

"Just like influenza in the fall, it's still a problem despite the vaccines and everything else," says Elting.

Health officials say one of the best things you can do to prevent the infection is keep your cuts and scratches clean. And when you change your bandages, throw the old ones in a couple of sealed plastic bags.

Blame all the hassle on people overusing antibiotics - or forgetting to take all of them. The bacteria have mutated and developed drug resistance.