Infection control
Limiting the spread
Hospitals continue to deal with Covid-19 patients alongside their usual intake, elevating the importance of infection control procedures in place to prevent disease from spreading. Jim Banks speaks to infection control experts B. Aditya Prakash of the Georgia Institute of Technology and Dr David Kuhar, who leads the CDC’s hospital infection prevention team, to better understand how to prevent hospital-acquired infections, and what has changed during the pandemic.
H
ospital-acquired infections (HAIs) have been a growing cause for concern for many years, with methicillin-resistant
staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) frequently grabbing the headlines due to its ability to cause life-threatening infections in patients. A growing body of data has shown that one of these infections – hospital-acquired pneumonia – which affects 1% of hospitalised patients in the UK, is the most common healthcare-associated infection contributing to death.
Great strides forward have been made in combatting the spread of infections in the healthcare setting, but a 2021 study by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) showed that US hospitals witnessed a significant increase in HAIs in 2020, inextricably linked with the Covid-19 pandemic.
The rise of more contagious variants, notably Omicron, is part of the reason for the spike in HAIs.
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But equally significant is the strain that high numbers of Covid-related hospital admissions are having on staff and resources.
In 2020, research by Sameer Kadri, an intensive- care physician at the National Institutes of Health Clinical Center, showed even in the early stages of the pandemic, the risk of a Covid-19 patient dying was greater when hospital staff were strained by high caseloads. In short, surges in the number of Covid-19 cases, and consequently hospitalisations, correlated with more deaths.
Though it is less likely to result in hospitalisation, the Omicron variant is more contagious than Delta, which itself is more transmissible than other strains, making the risk of spreading it within the confines of a hospital far greater should a patient be admitted. It is due to this increase in transmission risk that Covid-19 added another reason to why overcrowding in hospitals can lead to excess deaths.
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