Scientists in Singapore have discovered a new member of the nightmarish fungus family. In a new study this week, they detail their discovery of a genetically distinct type of fungus. Candida auris The bacteria, found in some of their patients, is the sixth species to have been discovered so far and is one of the most feared superbug threats because it is resistant to multiple antifungal drugs and spreads quickly in hospitals and other infection hotspots.
C. Auris It was first discovered in 2009. It usually does not cause illness in healthy people, but it can cause serious infections, especially in those with weakened immune systems. The infections are often difficult to prevent because they are resistant to some or all of the antifungal drugs available to treat them. It is also difficult to completely eradicate once it has become established in the environment.
C. Auris Although infections are still rare overall, there has been a large increase in cases in the United States and elsewhere in recent years, and the bacteria is steadily spreading to more parts of the world. of Lancet Microbeteeth, C. Auris There are still many secrets up in the air.
Doctors at Singapore General Hospital said: C. Auris It will be part of routine testing in April 2023. In Singapore, such cases tend to come from people who were infected elsewhere, but the patient reported not having traveled in the past two years, which intrigued doctors. Working with other researchers, they sequenced the strain’s genes and found that it didn’t exactly match any of the five known groups (clones) of bacteria that scientists have already described. The team then backtracked and tested the strain. C. Auris They found two more cases that matched the genetic signature of the original case in samples taken from previously hospitalized patients, as well as another sample taken from a patient in Bangladesh and uploaded to a public database by other scientists.
“We report the discovery of a proposed sixth major phylogenetic group. C. Auris “This includes three epidemiologically unrelated isolates detected in Singapore and one reported from Bangladesh,” the researchers wrote. “We propose this new clade based on extensive genomic analysis showing the clustering of these four isolates and their large genetic distance from the five known clades.”
The only saving grace of this discovery is that all of the hospitalized cases were treatable with conventional antifungal drugs. However, because these cases appear to be unrelated to each other, it is possible that this strain has already begun to spread silently in Singapore and possibly other parts of the world. It is also not known whether and how this strain differs from other strains in its ability to cause human disease or large-scale outbreaks. However, given the increasing reports of outbreaks around the world, “C. Auris “Fungi continue to pose a threat to public health,” the researchers write, and further measures are needed to monitor and detect this looming fungal threat in a timely manner.
