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Vancomycin-resistant enterococci (VRE) were first reported in 1986. Six years later, researchers working with mice demonstrated that the resistance gene, vanA, could be transferred from VRE to Staphylococcus aureus; the first clinical case of vanA-mediated vancomycin-resistant S. aureus (VRSA) infection was reported in June 2002 in Michigan. By the end of 2006, six additional cases had been documented — all of them in the U.S., and four in Michigan.
Among the seven case patients, most had multiple underlying conditions (e.g., diabetes, obesity, chronic renal insufficiency). Five patients had infected wounds or plantar ulcers, one had an infected intravascular catheter and a plantar ulcer, and one had asymptomatic bacteriuria. Two patients we…