New Staph Infection Spreads Among Gay Males

January 17, 2008 - A study released by the Annals of Internal Medicine recently has found that a highly resistant staph infection is spreading among gay populations in San Francisco, Boston, New York and Los Angeles.

The infection is methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA), which has mostly been confined to hospitalized patients.

According to San Francisco health officials, the risk of getting MRSA is 13 times greater for gay men than for the rest of the city's population.

"We probably had it here first, and now it is spreading elsewhere," said Binh An Diep, a researcher at San Francisco General Hospital. "This is a national problem, and San Francisco is at the epicenter."

The staph bacteria causes boils and other skin and soft tissue infections - and occurs frequently in the buttocks and genitalia.

The Centers for Disease Control says that various forms of MRSA are causing an estimated 95,000 infections and 19,000 deaths annually in the U.S.

According to Diep, "We are nowhere near the peak [of the epidemic]. The peak will occur when it spreads into the general population."

Additional Reading: Medical Issues.