Unpleasant Shigella Bacteria Going Around, Sometimes Antibiotic Resistant
PITTSBURGH (KDKA) – Health officials are warning of a stomach bug going around lately.
Shigella is a bacteria known to cause some extremely unpleasant and potentially dangerous gastrointestinal problems. But this strain is causing even more issues.
"We're seeing that these Shigella isolates are resistant to many antibiotics," said Dr. Marc Itskowitz at Allegheny General Hospital.
The CDC says recently there have been clusters of Shigella cases in Pennsylvania, Massachusetts and New York. And 90 percent of them are showing resistance to Cipro – typically the first antibiotics used to treat the illness, as well as other antibiotics.
"It causes gastrointestinal illness," said Itskowitz. "The most common symptoms are abdominal pain, diarrhea and fever."
"The most common concern for any diarrheal illness is dehydration," Itskowitz added.
The Allegheny County Health Department has had about 40 cases of Shigella since August. But at this point, none of the local cases were resistant to antibiotics.
The best way to protect yourself is to wash your hands, particularly before you prepare food.
"Shigella is thought to spread through contaminated food and water," said Iskowtiz. "So, the most important thing we can do is make sure we have good hand hygiene."
Iskowitz says the Norovirus is also going around. The big difference: Shigella symptoms can last for as long as a week in healthy patients and with the Norovirus, people typically feel better much sooner.
"It's more common to see that and usually it runs its course. I would say in 24-48 hours patients are starting to feel better," he said.
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