MINNEAPOLIS, January 2, 2008—Intensive-care units in New York and South Carolina are exploring the possibility that drug-resistant bacteria may do less well on copper and silver surfaces than they do on the stainless steel that is standard in most medical areas, according to an Associated Press story.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says that 1.7 million Americans develop infections every year while hospitalized. Almost 100,000 of these people die.

Medical manufacturers are looking to anti-germ coatings on silver and copper to improve those numbers. In November, the FDA approved the sale of the first breathing tube coated with silver, a metal long known to repel bacteria to some degree.

Ventilator patients are at high risk of getting pneumonia. In a multi-hospital study, 7.5 percent of patients given a regular breathing tube developed pneumonia, compared to 4.8 percent of those given the Argento ventilation tube.

Baxter HealthCare Corp was given clearance this fall by the FDA to use a silver-coated IV catheter connector, to prevent bacteria from accumulating at this entry point to the bloodstream.

Copper is also being studied for germ-resistant properties. In a British study published last year, drug-resistant staph germs survived for three days on stainless steel plates kept at room temperature, but the researchers found no sign of the germs on pure copper after 90 minutes. 

A new study is testing this hypothesis with a real-world experiment involving three drug-resistant bugs — staph, enterococci and acinetobacter. 

A Star Tribune version of the AP described the experiment:

"First, researchers are swabbing down a handful of ICU rooms at New York's Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, the Medical University of South Carolina and Charleston's Veterans Affairs Medical Center. They must learn where the germs lurk, explains Sloan-Kettering lead researcher Dr. Kent Sepkowitz. Then the hospitals will substitute copper for some germ-prone surfaces in those rooms, and track if the change makes a difference."

Copper and silver, of course, are more expensive than stainless steel.  But losing patients to in-hospital infections is even more expensive,

Complete AP story