staphylococcus

Spherical bacterium that occurs in clusters. It is found on the skin and mucous membranes of humans and other animals. It can cause abscesses and systemic infections that may prove fatal.

Staphylococcus aureus is a very common bacterium, present in the nose in 30% of people. Normally it gives no trouble, but, largely due to over-prescribing of antibiotics, strains have arisen that are resistant to the drugs used to treat them, principally methicillin, a semisynthetic form of penicillin. Methicillin-resistant S. aureus (MRSA) strains represent a serious hazard to the critically ill or immunosuppressed.

MRSA normally responds to two antibiotics which are considered too toxic for use in any but life-threatening infections (vancomycin and teicoplanin) but it still causes fatalities.

In 1997 a previously unknown Staphylococcus species was brought to life by US microbiologists from dormant spores in amber. It is quite unlike modern Staphylococcus species, and its proposed name is Staphylococcus succinus.