© RICHARD BIZLEY/SCIENCE SOURCE
In July 2011, a 43-year-old woman walked out of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) Clinical Center in Bethesda, Maryland, after a month of battling a serious bacterial infection. Three weeks later, two more patients tested positive for the same bacterial strain after checking into the clinic. Over the next four months, the pathogen, a multidrug-resistant form of Klebsiella pneumoniae, continued to spread; approximately one clinic patient acquired the infection every week.
Clinicians threw up walls—both physical and chemical—to contain the pathogen. All patients were kept isolated and under surveillance; after the fourth case, infected patients were placed in a separate section of the center and tended to by a dedicated staff using dedicated instruments. Visitors wore caps, gowns, and gloves, surfaces were routinely washed ...
