--- title: Bacteria: Scientists Find a Rare Superbug In Houston description: Infections caused by an antibiotic resistant strain of the superbug Klebsiella pneumoniae (K. pneumoniae) are appearing in Houston hospitals canonical: https://time.com/4780332/bacteria-superbug-houston/ author: Alexandra Sifferlin article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2017-05-16T14:43:13.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-02-23T04:56:38.959Z article:section: Health og:title: Scientists Find a Rare Superbug In Houston og:description: Infections caused by an antibiotic resistant strain of the superbug Klebsiella pneumoniae (K. pneumoniae) are appearing in Houston hospitals og:url: https://time.com/4780332/bacteria-superbug-houston/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltffdff695bb76d688/6988cd6f2dce01d10b9ed817/k-bacteria.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 3780 og:image:height: 2126 og:image:alt: K BACTERIA og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Scientists Find a Rare Superbug In Houston twitter:description: Infections caused by an antibiotic resistant strain of the superbug Klebsiella pneumoniae (K. pneumoniae) are appearing in Houston hospitals twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltffdff695bb76d688/6988cd6f2dce01d10b9ed817/k-bacteria.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Scientists Find a Rare Superbug In Houston > Sponsored content. 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Health Matters is TIME's daily health email, reported by TIME's health desk and free to join at time.com/newsletters. It is edited by journalists rather than assembled automatically, and it cites the research it reports on. #### Is Health Matters free? Yes. Health Matters is a free daily newsletter from TIME, available at time.com/newsletters. #### Who reads TIME's Health Matters newsletter? Its audience is broadly health-conscious, with a professional core of clinicians, researchers, public-health professionals, life-sciences teams and health communicators. by [Alexandra Sifferlin](https://time.com/author/alexandra-sifferlin/) ## Alexandra Sifferlin May 16, 2017 2:43 PM UTC  Friedländer's pneumobacillus (Friedländer's bacillus), Klebsiella pneumoniae. This bacterium is the cause of some respiratory diseases in the lungs and particularly in the bronchial tubes. It is also the cause of throat infections, as well as infections in the bile duct and surgical wounds. Optical microscopy x 400. Friedländer's pneumobacillus (Friedländer's bacillus), Klebsiella pneumoniae. This bacterium is the cause of some respiratory diseases in the lungs and particularly in the bronchial tubes. It is also the cause of throat infections, as well as infections in the bile duct and surgical wounds. Optical microscopy x 400. Getty Images by [Alexandra Sifferlin](https://time.com/author/alexandra-sifferlin/) ## Alexandra Sifferlin May 16, 2017 2:43 PM UTC Infections caused by an uncommon superbug—one resistant to several kinds of antibiotics—are increasingly showing up in a Houston hospital system, according to new research published Tuesday in the [journal _mBio_](http://mbio.asm.org/content/8/3/e00489-17.full). Researchers from the Houston Methodist Research Institute sequenced the genomes of many different strains of the bacteria _Klebsiella pneumoniae_, which caused 1,777 infections in the Houston Methodist hospital system from 2011 to 2015\. K. pneumoniae is known to cause serious health problems, including pneumonia and bloodstream infections. They found that an uncommon strain, clone type 307, was the most prevalent. **MORE:** [I Survived Flesh-Eating Bacteria—And It Changed My Life Forever](http://time.com/4771484/flesh-eating-bacteria-amputation/) “It’s like if I told you that all around the world, 80% of cake is vanilla,” says study author Dr. S. Wesley Long, associate director of the Clinical Microbiology Laboratory at Houston Methodist Hospital. “We come to Houston and we expect to find vanilla cake, but half of the cakes are red velvet.” Why this rare strain is so common among Houston patients is not yet known, but it has recently been shown to be resistant to several types of antibiotics. In January, officials at the [U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC)](https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/66/wr/mm6601a7.htm?s%5Fcid=mm6601a7%5Fw) reported that a Nevada woman had died from a K. pneumoniae infection after it was unresponsive to 26 different antibiotics. The Houston researchers say that while there is resistance, the strain is still responsive to certain antibiotics. “We are still trying to come to terms with what the implications are,” says Long. “We don’t want to alarm anyone, because the local superbug is no more virulent than the other \[strains\]. There’s nothing about it that makes it any worse for patients or requires it to be treated differently.” ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4780332/bacteria-superbug-houston/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4780332/bacteria-superbug-houston/"},"headline":"Scientists Find a Rare Superbug In Houston","datePublished":"2017-05-16T14:43:13.000Z","dateModified":"2026-02-23T04:56:38.959Z","description":"Infections caused by an antibiotic resistant strain of the superbug Klebsiella pneumoniae (K. pneumoniae) are appearing in Houston hospitals","url":"https://time.com/4780332/bacteria-superbug-houston/","keywords":["superbugs","Drugs","Houston","Bacteria","antibiotics","antibiotic","Superbug"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltffdff695bb76d688/6988cd6f2dce01d10b9ed817/k-bacteria.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Alexandra Sifferlin","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/alexandra-sifferlin/"}],"articleSection":"Health","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltffdff695bb76d688/6988cd6f2dce01d10b9ed817/k-bacteria.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"K BACTERIA","caption":"Friedländer's pneumobacillus (Friedländer's bacillus), Klebsiella pneumoniae. 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