VCU EXPERT ALERT: Internal medicine physician is internationally known in infectious disease and antibiotic resistant bacteria

By Anne Buckley

KEYWORDS: MRSA, antibiotic resistant bacteria, infectious disease, super bug

Richard P. Wenzel, M.D., chair of internal medicine at Virginia Commonwealth University and president of the International Society for Infectious Diseases, is available for comment on Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus, or MRSA.

Outbreaks of MRSA infections have been reported nationwide in recent weeks, and a Virginia high school student’s death this week has been attributed to the strain. MRSA is a strain of Staph bacteria that does not respond to penicillin and related antibiotics but can be treated with other drugs.

Wenzel, author of “Stalking Microbes: A Relentless Pursuit of Infection Control,” is a professor of internal medicine at VCU and an internationally known expert on infectious diseases. He is the first editor-at-large of the New England Journal of Medicine and was among the leading commentators on the SARS outbreak. He was at the forefront of the national debate on smallpox vaccination.

A 2004 editorial Wenzel wrote for the New England Journal of Medicine called for scientists, the federal government and the pharmaceutical industry to work together quickly to solve the growing crisis of antibiotic-resistant bacteria.