Over winter break some concern had been building up among EvCC staff and faculty due to an email that reported two cases of Methicillin-Resistant Staphylococcus Aureus (MRSA) within the school.

Rumors spread that MRSA was a factor in an instructor’s death; however this has since been verified as false.

Much of the concern comes from a misunderstanding of what MRSA actually is.

“It is like bacteria…most of the time it doesn’t make us sick, but if you get it inside the body then it causes disease,” said microbiology and disease instructor, Rene Kratz.

Bob Wright, director of campus safety and emergency management, was first informed of the situation when a faculty member contacted him that another member in the community had been diagnosed with MRSA and wasn’t sure how to handle the information.

This is the first time any report of this nature has been brought to Wright’s attention in the two years that he has worked here.

He later sent out an email, providing information about MRSA that was addressed to “all campus”.

“I guess all campus, does not mean all campus,” said Wright, as only faculty received the email.

For any information to be sent out to students it must be approved by the vice president of the overseeing department.

“If there were a real health concern…we would communicate with students and staff in a number of channels, including Facebook, text messaging, our digital signage, our phone system and/or all-student e-mail.  That isn't the case with this latest communication from Bob,” said vice president of college

advancement and executive director of the EvCC foundation, John Olson, via email.

According to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention, bacteria lives commonly on the skin or in the nose as staphylococcus, or staph. MRSA is a strain of staph bacteria that is resistant to most antibiotics. This was identified in the 1960’s in hospitals and nursing homes when antibiotics were being given to people even when unnecessary.

Statistically one in four healthy people carry staph bacteria and two percent of the population carries MRSA.

MRSA is more of a concern in hospitals rather than in a community such as the college.

“Somebody who visits a hospital and has had any kind of surgery [may] be affected by this disease because of cuts during a surgery. It causes pneumonia and food-born disease,” said Kratz.

In an effort to control MRSA in 2010, which has been increasing within the population, the state Senate Bill ESHB1123 required that all hospitals test patients for MRSA before surgery and report to the Department of Health. This was due in part to the 19,000 people that died in the hospital due to MRSA in 2005.

While the spread in MRSA in the community has increased from 19 to 35 percent, it only affects people when an infection occurs on the skin, which can be “red, swollen, painful, warm to touch, full of pus and accompanied by fever,” according to Wright’s email. This, however, is treatable.

MRSA is transmitted through skin to skin contact and can be avoided by washing hands regularly, keeping cuts and scrapes clean and covered, avoiding contact with people’s wounds and bandages and showering after using exercise equipment.