Welsh surveillance data show plateau

EDITOR—Crowcroft and Catchpole conclude from a study of death certificates that infections due to methicillin resistant Staphylococcus aureus are an increasing cause of mortality in England and Wales.1 That this was likely to have been the case in Wales over the period of their study, 1993-8, is supported by surveillance data, which show a large rise in bacteraemias caused by S aureus between 1991 and 1997 (figure).

This can largely be attributed to increasing occurrence of methicillin resistant S aureus as a cause of these infections from 1993, although a smaller rise in methicillin sensitive S aureus bacteraemias was also recorded. The degree to which this increase in staphylococcal bacteraemias has affected outcomes in relation to the underlying clinical conditions is, however, …