Madam, - Alan Shatter (December 6th) rightly describes MRSA as a major health issue. But he undermines the very doctor-patient relationship which he claims MRSA is destroying when he says that "rarely are [ patients] told how or where it was contracted". The simple fact is that quite often this is not known.
Recent studies report that MRSA can be community-acquired in 50 per cent of cases, is transmitted by contact, usually via hands, and is often without symptoms, the healthy "carrier" usually being unaware that he or she has been colonised by the organism. All this makes it impossible to pinpoint the exact time or place of infection. Any difficulties a nurse or doctor has in providing patients with answers stems from this fact, not from the type of conspiracy Mr Shatter implies.
In the past patients may not have been informed as to the exact name of an infection they were found to have. But today patients are told, and quite often ask, the exact nature of the organism that infects them. This is a development welcomed by all doctors and nurses, and results from greater public awareness and education, not because doctors and nurses have ceased conspiring.
I also find it interesting that a man who served as a politician for 21 years refers to the "public relations stunts and clowning in which politicians regularly engage". Perhaps Mr Shatter is apologising for previous acts - or, given that he was nominated by Fine Gael to run in the next general election and is issuing almost weekly media statements such as this letter, he is apologising in advance for future transgressions? - Yours, etc,
Dr MARK CORRIGAN, Chestnut Grove, Classis Lake, Cork.