How staph became drug-resistant threat

Link: How staph became drug-resistant threat -- chicagotribune.com.

The evolutionary path of the bacterium called MRSA wound around the globe for decades before a pair of Chicago doctors in 1996 noticed the bug had taken an ominous turn. Before then, the germ's resistance to antibiotics was of concern mainly in hospitals, where steadily growing numbers of patients were contending with the stubborn staph infection. Reports of healthy people who contracted MRSA outside of a hospital were rare and isolated, the stuff of obscure medical journal articles. But the bacterium, formally known as methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus, was beginning to depart from the habits it had settled into during years of adaptation to human hosts.