Last June, the US Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) warned health clinics about the emergence of a new multidrug-resistant yeast strain called Candida auris. Just a few months later, the first seven cases of C. auris infection in the US were reported. Now it's clear that the fungus has started a march through US hospitals, and healthcare officials are concerned. C. auris is a recently discovered fungus species that can cause severe infections in humans. It was first described in 2009, discovered in a Japanese patient with a nasty ear infection. Since then, it has been detected in nine countries on four continents, and data shows it has "high potential to cause outbreaks in healthcare facilities". According to the latest CDC report, 77 C. auris clinical cases have now been identified across seven US states, with additional 45 cases found via screening of people who were in contact with the patients. Of the clinical cases, nearly 70 percent were identified in the New