Leslie Ash backs £1.4 million campaign to fight superbugs

08 June 2009

Actress Leslie Ash has urged people to join the fight against deadly hospital superbugs by supporting a new £1.4 million fundraising campaign led by The University of Nottingham.

The money will fund research by world-leading scientists at the University’s Centre for Healthcare Associated Infections (CHAI) into new methods of preventing and treating superbug infections, such as MRSA and Clostridium difficile (C.diff), which are responsible for thousands of deaths every year.

Over the past decade, almost 37,000 people have died after contracting one of these two devastating infections, while C.diff alone killed more people in the UK in 2007 than all road accidents that year.

Leslie, who is patron of CHAI and faced a long and difficult recovery after contracting MSSA, a strain related to MRSA, five years ago, said: “Stopping healthcare-associated infections, funding treatments and raising funds for research and prevention are vital — I can’t stress this enough.

“I’m proud to be the patron of CHAI. I was one of the unfortunate ones to contract an MSSA infection and it changed my life. It’s taken five long years and a lot of support from those I love to regain any sort of normality.

“At CHAI, they are working so hard to stop anyone else’s life being affected by these deadly bugs and I would urge people to support CHAI in any way they can.”

The Centre for Healthcare Associated Infections (CHAI) brings together nine different academic schools at The University of Nottingham, covering a wide range of disciplines, and clinical colleagues from Nottingham University Hospitals NHS Trust.

Current research projects being undertaken at the centre include:

•    Developing new vaccines and antibiotics
•    Rapidly detecting and identifying strains of C.diff
•    Improved rapid diagnostic tests for MRSA, especially the very serious community-associated MRSA (CA-MRSA) strains
•    Understanding how C.diff spreads in hospitals

Professor Richard James, a leading international expert on healthcare-acquired infections and Director of CHAI, said: “It is crucial that we find new ways of preventing, diagnosing and treating infections like MRSA and C.diff. It took over 13 years to start reducing the number of hospital infections and deaths caused by these superbugs in the UK but new strains, such as CA-MRSA (community-acquired MRSA), are now appearing and present a formidable new challenge. We are delighted that Leslie is once again lending us her support and helping to get this important message across.

“There is currently no national charity dedicated to funding research into these killer infections, so anyone contributing to this fundraising campaign — no matter how big or small their donation — can be sure that their money will make a real difference.”

Donations to the campaign can be made by contacting Emma Pearson in The University of Nottingham’s Development Office on 0115 951 3724 or by e-mail at emma.pearson@nottingham.ac.uk

More information about the Centre for Healthcare Associated Infections (CHAI) is available on the web at www.hcai.nottingham.ac.uk