PHOTO SOURCE: The Conversation - Man in a hospital via Shutterstock.

“Ebola. Zika. Superbugs resistant to antibiotics.

“The headlines brim with news of infectious threats. Our lawmakers just battled over more than $1 billion in funding for Zika, the mosquito-borne virus that has caused serious birth defects in at least nine babies born in the U.S. and has been diagnosed in at least 1,306 Americans.

“But far more mundane infections kill thousands of Americans each year – infections that patients caught in the very hospitals they’ve trusted to make them better. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, hospital infections affect almost two million Americans every year. About 99,000 die each year as a result.

“Take urinary tract infections, or UTIs. About 12 percent of hospital-acquired infections are UTIs. Such infections often start from microbes that attach and grow on the urinary catheters that medical teams insert into the bladders of countless hospital patients every year.

“A cause of infection - and of discomfort”

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