In which mankind continues to not learn its lesson....

We are supposed to learn from past mistakes, supposedly this is why we fervently "learn history" in school. Glean insights, do it better the next time, etc.

Overall, I should say I respect all that medical research has provided to us. We are so lucky to have the treatments, diagnosis and options available. I highly disagree with the access and affordability of it all, but that's not what this post is about. This post is about me catching MRSA, an antibiotic resistant strain of Staph bacteria.

I am not in the medical profession, nor am I professing to "know all" about MRSA. However, I need a platform to voice my frustration on the medical "expertise" I've received and this process. Essentially, as far as I can tell, MRSA exists, because we created it. We over prescribe antibiotics, we (as patients) don't take our whole prescription and flush it into our water system, we treat animals with antibiotics and then eat their meat - ingesting the antibiotics into our systems. We perpetuate the problem of diseases and illnesses that become resistant to treatment.

I've had one doctor, a dermatologist, treat this with seriousness but not alarm. I've had midwives who have treated this seriously and with some moderate alarm. And then our pediatrician who seemed to not think this was anything to worry about. My sister had a family in her church just a year ago in Pennsylvania that was essentially given the "lockdown" from the county due to the kids having MRSA. They were told to bleach their home continuously until the situation was cleared and the kids shouldn't go out until their "rashes" had healed.

Why the varying degrees of concern and treatment, people? We still have hospitals close down entire wings to avoid the spread of this nasty bug. (Yes, I know the MRSA in hospitals is slightly different than the community spread MRSA...still nasty). I find I agree with the Pennsylvania county - don't treat this lightly. Act in ways that protect your family and community. Use antibacterial products and bleach to get the germ gone from your life. Don't assume it is gone until doctors test you and you can see it is gone. For anyone with a compromised immune system, this is serious business!

So what happens now? There is a new superbug in hospitals, called Clos­tridium difficile (C. diff). Supposedly this little bug is equally nasty to MRSA and also caused by antibiotic overuse. Will we learn our lesson? Will we have some other bug in five years? There has got to be a way to treat patients (and our food) responsibly and start to reverse the downward spiral we've created. Hello history...can you teach us a lesson here? Will we listen?...