Hospitals have been traditionally a great place to get sick, being hotbeds of a plethora of infections. It is not unheard of for people to go into the hospital sick and become sicker thanks to their stay.
And in spite of concerted attempts to make the hospital a safer place to be, the numbers of post-operative infections and catheter-associated infections continue to increase.
In their annual government study, the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality has estimated that every year 100,000 deaths are attributable to infections which have been contracted while the patient was in the hospital.
"Dr. Carolyn M. Clancy, the agency’s director, pointed out that projects across the country had shown remarkable success in reducing infection rates by adhering to basic standards for hand hygiene, disinfection of patients, sterile handling of equipment and proper use of antibiotics. But at many hospitals those successes have yet to overcome an entrenched medical culture."
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/14/us/14infect.html?partner=rss&emc=rss