AN antibiotic-resistant superbug is making its way back to and spreading through the United States that causes severe diarrhea in nearly half a million people nationwide each year.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reported that the bug, Shigella sonnei, infected 243 people in 32 states and Puerto Rico between May 2015 and February 2015. Among cases include clusters in California, Massachusetts and Pennsylvania, where the CDC discovered that 90 percent were resistant to ciprofloxacin (Cipro), the antibiotic of choice when treating shigellosis. In San Francisco, about 100 cases were linked to an outbreak among homeless people.
Other cases were related to international travel, whom the CDC reported on Thursday, April 2, in an investigation published in its “Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, are re-introducing the bacteria. However, it also said that shigella “is now circulating domestically.”
Most strains of this bacteria are already resistant to various drugs used to treat it, and public health experts have said that a strain resistant to Cipro is spreading around the globe.
“Drug-resistant infections are harder to treat and because Shigella spreads to easily between people, the potential for more – and larger – outbreaks is a real concern, said CDC Director Dr. Tom Frieden in a statement.
Shigella can spread rapidly through contaminated water and food or insufficient sanitation. It is typically found in areas such as nursing homes and childcare centers, homeless communities, according to the CDC.
“Getting just a little bit of the Shigella bacteria into your mouth is enough to cause infection,” according to the National Library of Medicine.
Men who have sex with men are also at an increased risk, according to the CDC.
Infection caused by Shigella typically subsides on its own and is not deadly. Symptoms manifest shortly after infection and include diarrhea that is often bloody, abdominal pain, and cramps, among others.
The CDC was first alerted of the new Shigella strain in December 2014. (With reports from Bloomberg and TIME)