New MRSA Strain in Jessamine Co.

Uh-oh. Just saw this on FOX News:

West Jessamine High School junior Ryan Robinson was placed on life support at the University of Kentucky Hospital after being diagnosed with methicillin-resistant staphylococcus aureus — or MRSA.

The Lexington Herald-Leader reported that was confirmed by Sam Pile, who coaches the youth's soccer team.

Pile said Robinson played well Thursday, but said his mother said the boy fell ill that night. His ailment was first diagnosed as influenza, but MRSA was later discovered.

Jessamine County Schools Superintendent Lu S. Young said the school and the Career and Technical Center have been thoroughly cleaned.

MRSA, aka Necrotizing Fasciitis, aka the "Flesh Eating Bacteria", stands for "Methicillin Resistant Staphylococcus aureus", and it's seriously scary stuff. Just a few weeks ago, ABC News ran a story about how some say it's becoming a dangerous new sexually transmitted disease, and is increasingly being treated as an epidemic. The Mayo Clinic says:

Most MRSA infections occur in hospitals or other health care settings, such as nursing homes and dialysis centers. It's known as health care-associated MRSA, or HA-MRSA. Older adults and people with weakened immune systems are at most risk of HA-MRSA. More recently, another type of MRSA has occurred among otherwise healthy people in the wider community.

That new wider-ranging superstrain is known as Community-associated MRSA, and is apparently what we have here in Nicholasville.

Just how swift and how scary is it? Well, this teen was healthy and playing soccer in the afternoon. By evening, he was severely ill. By morning, he's in critical condition.