Golden staph (staphylococcus aureus) is as common as the nose on our faces. MRSA is Multiple Resistant Staph. aureus aka Methicillin Resistant Staph. aureus. This bug comes in more varieties than smiths crisps depending on which antibiotics it is resistant to and other virulence factors (technical term for how aggressive it is when a person is infected)The thing to consider is that MRSA is hard to treat and some strains of MRSA can be particularly nasty and will eat you alive, others are difficult to treat but will just slowly linger, only to re-infect. Some people are carriers and will have MRSA on them causing no problems, typically Staph aureus, both MRSA and non multiply resistant can be found in the nose & skin of people with no ill effect. It has the potential to infect wounds, of both carriers and people they touch.
Treatment options? conventional medicine is looking at an almost bare cupboard.
Ever heard of VRE? (vancomycin resistant Enterococcus), this bug is resistant to the only antibiotic in the cupboard, vancomycin, with which some strains of MRSA can be treated with. The fear is that if MRSA & VRE do a cross species genetic transfer we'll have an untreatable strain of MRSA then it's game set and match for conventional medicine versus Staph aureus. Wikipaedia Staph aureus or take it from me this organism, be it the MRSA or garden variety still sensitive to everything back to penicillin is still the most common infective agent of man.
In short,Staph aureus is everywhere, MRSA is widespread (and in many hospitals), BUT there's MRSA and there's MRSA, some strains are worse than others but all are difficult to treat, some are sensitive to oral antibiotics while others are resistant to all but the most powerful IV antibiotics.
