As the swine flu crisis nears pandemic proportions, millions worldwide brace for possible exposure to a virus more dangerous than many other flu bugs — a virus so dangerous it could kill.

But while fighting swine flu is vital, in some ways the media coverage of it and public panic toward it are disproportionate, at least in the context of other deadly infections which assail us daily and rarely are noted on the public radar that swine flu now commands.

These other afflictions are varied and many, but they include what is virtually a hidden epidemic: hospital acquired infections.

It’s estimated that 2 million Americans suffer each year from infections acquired in a hospital, and of those, 90,000 people die. That’s more annual deaths than from breast cancer, AIDS and traffic accidents — combined.

That’s also far more than the previous pandemic flu’s toll in America, when the Hong Kong flu of 1968-69 took 33,800 lives. Yet are we bracing against hospital acquired infections? For the most part, no. But at Jim S. Adler & Associates, yes.

Hospital patients have a right to safe, effective care, and in far too many cases, they aren’t getting it. Instead, hospital staff fall down on the job of cleansing themselves, equipment and rooms. In these and other ways, they fail to prevent infections in hospitals from spreading among patients.

Hospitals have long hid beneath the claim that some infections acquired in their facilities were inevitable, taking a “so sorry, but that’s the way it goes” attitude. But with research showing that virtually all hospital acquired infections are preventable, this excuse of “inevitable risk” has become unsupportable.

Indeed, it’s believed that at least half of all infections acquired in a hospital would be prevented if care givers simply washed their hands each time before touching a patient. One procedure. One million patients spared. Think about it.

Yet in Texas alone, up to 160,000 persons yearly suffer infections from their own health care, including ambulatory surgical centers, home care and hospitals. And nationwide, even beyond the 2 million hospital acquired infections, another 1.5 million Americans are infected in long-term care institutions such as nursing homes.

And so, though the swine flu scare is certainly a crisis worth heeding, so is America’s hidden epidemic of infections inflicted on persons at health-care facilities. Such facilities have no excuse but are guilty of sheer negligence — negligence that’s killing 90,000 Americans per year.

If you or a family member has suffered an infection from a hospital or from another health care facility or provider, don’t take it lying down. Alert a personal injury attorney with Jim S. Adler & Associates and fight back in the legal realm.

A hospital is fully responsible for any infections it inflicts upon patients, and it must be held accountable for those patients’ medical costs, lost wages and pain and suffering arising as a result. Medical care is costly enough as it is. An Adler personal injury lawyer can attack that cost by holding responsible those whose negligence has harmed you or a loved one.

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