Candida auris: Resistant yeast developed into a worldwide health threat
Global health threat of the yeast fungus Candida auris
The yeast fungus Candida auris has been developed in the past years in different countries of the world for numerous cases of illness. According to experts, the rare mushroom to identify. He is also resistant to conventional anti-fungal agent resistant. The US health authority CDC, Candida auris is a “serious global health threat.”
Several Deaths
In the fall of 2016, the US health authority CDC had reported for the first time about a new fungal disease that runs in some cases, fatal. The yeast fungus Candida auris was therefore brought in to the USA with several deaths. The fungus was detected for the first Time in 2009 in a patient in Japan as the causative agent of a Otomykose (fungal disease of the external auditory canal). But, in the meantime, the grass he is also in many other countries. According to the CDC, he now presents a “serious global health threat.”
Infection can be life-threatening
On the skin hosts a variety of microorganisms, live yeast, including. Fungi of the genus Candida can be detected in about 75 percent of the people.
With a healthy immune system, the yeasts are on the skin and the mucous membranes is usually not a Problem.
They live on the skin without you knowing about it. And even if they lead to diseases of Yeast of the skin, can often help simple home remedies for Candida.
However, if the new yeast Candida auris ends up in the bloodstream, can often lives in hospitals and other health care facilities emerging infectious dangerous.
Increased attention without undue alarmist
“Candida auris can get at the Infected in the blood stream and Sepsis, a blood poisoning that cause,” said Professor Oliver Kurzai, in a communication of the University of Würzburg, to which the physician holds the chair for Medical Microbiology and Mycology.
He also heads the National reference center for invasive fungal infections (NRZMyk) in Jena.
Professor Kurzai is one of the authors of an opinion of experts from Germany and Austria, in the recommended in connection with Candida auris is an increased attention, but at the same time against unnecessary panic will be warned.
Difficult to identify
According to the US health authority CDC (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) Candida auris, however, a “serious global health threat.”
The authority justifies this on the grounds that the mushroom is to identify the major routine tests are difficult to treat due to widespread drug resistance severely.
Dangerous he is, because it came up outbreaks, especially in health care facilities.
Candida auris colonized the ears and the respiratory tract, however, it can also cause in the blood or in wounds serious infections.
People with weakened immune systems are at risk
According to health experts, of the mushroom for people with a weakened immune system, diabetes, or preterm birth is a mortal danger – those groups of people is a multi-organ suffer after infection, there is often failure.
Based on the, as yet, comparatively few cases, the CDC has found that about 40 to 60 percent of Candida auris infected patients have died.
However, it is usually not exactly say whether the fungus was the cause, because it involved seriously ill patients.
“For a healthy person, Candida auris is not a threat,” said Professor Kurzai.
Spread could not be stopped
Worry prepares experts that the spread could not be stopped. In recent years, a number of diseases with the dangerous yeast fungus have been recorded, among other things, in the USA, UK and India.
Also for Germany is expected to increase in cases. However, there have been only isolated cases.
The NRZMyk four cases are known, there is also a case that verbally has been reported.
In January of 2018, Candida was detected auris by the Agency for health and food safety (AGES) for the first time in Austria.
As it is said in a communication, had visited a Patient in Styria due to prolonged ear canal inflammation, a doctor established that the einsandte for the purpose of investigation on microbial pathogens a Ohrabstrich for AGES.
According to the figures, the Patient was treated successfully.
New drug gives hope
Since then, the yeast showed up for the first time, researchers are working to find out what makes him so aggressive, and how he could be treated.
Scientists at the Case Western Reserve University and University Hospitals of Cleveland (Ohio) came here, apparently a step further.
In a study, they were able to show that a new drug compound drug-resistant kills duck C. auris, both in the laboratory and in a mouse model that mimics human infection.
According to a report by “Science Daily” tested the experts the drug in violation of 16 different C. auris strains were collected from infected patients in Germany, Japan, South Korea and India.
As you expose the isolates to the new drug, they found it more effective than nine other currently available antifungal agents.
Promising Anti-Fungal Agent
According to the study leader, Mahmoud A. Ghannoum, Professor of dermatology at the medical faculty of the Case Western Reserve University is one of the most exciting Element of the study is that the patients a promising anti-fungal, and brings you one step closer.
It forms the basis for a clinical Phase-1 studies, in which low concentrations of the drug are studied in healthy adults and potential safety concerns will be tested.
Such studies are urgently needed, as the C. auris infection adhere worldwide to a serious threat to the health of bodies has become and the drug resistance is on the rise.
“Limited treatment options require the development of new drugs against this devastating infection to be effective,” says Ghannoum. “We hope that we have contributed in some way to the development of new drugs.”
