Ten infants hospitalized in the neonatal intensive care unit at UC Irvine Medical Center tested positive for the same MRSA strain, most recently in March, and the source has not been identified.
The superbug outbreak, first reported Thursday by the Los Angeles Times, triggered a complaint by a patient safety advocate to the California Department of Public Health. In an April 3 inspection report, the state said no violation of regulations had been found.
UCI said in a statement Thursday that all the babies were successfully treated with antibiotics and topical medicines.
But the filer of the complaint, Marian Hollingsworth, a member of the state’s Healthcare Associated Infection Advisory Committee, said she was dismayed that neither county health officials nor the Orange hospital alerted the public about the infections.