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The federal government is poised to stamp out superbugs in Canadian hospitals - in the biggest national effort to date to reduce a scourge that kills more than 8,000 patients every year.

The Public Health Agency of Canada says it will develop a plan by January on how to reduce the staggering number of infections occurring in the nation's hospitals. An estimated 220,000 patients who walk through the doors of hospitals each year suffer the unintended and often devastating consequences of an infection.

"The issue needs leadership and that's what the federal government can provide," said Frank Plummer, director-general of the agency's Centre for Infectious Disease Prevention and Control. He labelled hospital-acquired infections as an "extremely important public-health issue."

Speaking from Winnipeg, Dr. Plummer said hospital-acquired infections kill 8,000 to 12,000 people a year, and "for the most part, they're preventable."

As part of the initiative, Dr. Plummer said Ottawa will come up with a target for reducing the number of infections.

The superbug to be eradicated from the nation's hospitals has not yet been selected, said Dr. Plummer, although the possibilities include methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA), vancomycin-resistant enterococci (VRE) and Clostridium difficile (C. difficile).

Of particular interest is MRSA, he said, as it is one of the most common super bugs and responds to "search and destroy" tactics.

Over the weekend, The Globe and Mail published a series of stories that revealed the human toll of hospital-acquired infections and how, as early as next month, Canada's biggest research hospital, the University Health Network, is planning to start screening every overnight patient for MRSA and VRE.

MRSA can hide inside a nostril, on a hand or in a piece of soiled clothing. Symptoms can vary from a blotch of reddened skin treatable with a topical antibiotic to a merciless attack that causes blood poisoning, decayed lungs, pneumonia and infected heart valves.

For those reasons, it has become public enemy No. 1 in England and the United States, where it has already colonized hospitals.

The formidable hospital invader is making significant inroads in Canada, where the rate of those colonized and infected over the past decade has increased tenfold. Some of the highest rates have been noted in Quebec and Ontario, according to the Canadian Nosocomial Infection Surveillance Program study, which looked at MRSA in 38 hospitals in nine provinces.

Ontario is something of an MRSA hot spot: 13,458 patients were found to be colonized or infected with it last year, the highest number the province has ever recorded, according to figures from Ontario's Quality Management Program - Laboratory Services.

Up until now, efforts to reduce super-bug infections were largely left to individual hospitals.

The federal government will have enormous sway in bringing hospitals, health authorities and nursing homes together to participate in measures that have been proven to reduce infections. As well, not only will the measures be implemented by hospitals that choose them, but they will also be audited and measured to show what impact they are having.

The Public Health Agency of Canada will be the lead on the project, working with several other groups, including the Community and Hospital Infection Control Association of Canada to develop the interventions required. It will also work closely with the Safer Healthcare Now! steering committee, a national group that helps implement safer health-care practices in hospitals.

Together, they will finalize the details of data collection and how the interventions will be rolled out.

At least 200 health-care organizations, including hospitals, health authorities and long-term-care homes are expected to participate, according to Phil Hassen, chief executive officer of the Canadian Patient Safety Institute and chairman of the Safer Healthcare Now! steering committee.

Dr. Plummer said he plans to have the interventions selected by January. A date for them to go to hospitals has not yet been determined. Even coming up with the set of interventions by January, he said, is a "pretty ambitious deadline."

Key interventions to be looked at include selecting the right antibiotics and using them only when warranted, hand hygiene and patient screening.

Yesterday, Mr. Hassen of the Canadian Patient Safety Institute said he was delighted by the move, saying patients can expect to see real change in the form of fewer infections.

As for the interventions, he said, hand hygiene will likely be a key measure.

"No question, hand hygiene is No. 1," said Mr. Hassen, noting that only 40 per cent of health-care workers wash their hands properly.

Part of the problem, according to Susan Brien, the Canadian Patient Safety Institute's director of operations for Quebec, Eastern Canada and Nunavut, is that alcohol rubs are not always where they should be - next to a patient's bedside or in the pocket of a health-care worker.

Most hand sanitizers are outside of the patient's room, which means they are used less often than they should be.

Getting the hand sanitizers in the right place is "going to be a big challenge in Canada," said Dr. Brien, a neurosurgeon.

Also yesterday, Sharon Sholzberg-Gray, president and chief executive officer of the Canadian Healthcare Association, said hospitals should be forthright with patients who have developed an infection in their institution. As well, super-bug infection rates should be published by individual hospitals, provided they are put in context. Provinces should also compel hospitals and other health-care facilities to make the super bugs reportable to provincial bodies.

"We're very committed to patient safety being at the top of everyone's agenda," Ms. Sholzberg-Gray said.