Has vancomycin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus started going it alone?
Long-term treatment with vancomycin in severely ill patients has been the scenario for the emergence of vancomycin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (VRSA). 1 Vancomycin-intermediate S aureus (VISA) and the first VRSA strain were isolated in this classic setting. 1 , 2 Recently, however, Cynthia Whitener and colleagues 3 reported that the second VRSA strain to be discovered was isolated from a patient in Pennsylvania, USA, who had not been exposed to vancomycin for 5 years. Does this mean that VRSA is becomin …
