Group: Only acceptable infection rate is 0

NEW YORK, July 10 (UPI) -- A former New York state lieutenant governor says the state's performance on lowering rates of hospital-acquired infections is not good enough.

"The New York State Hospital-Acquired Infection Reporting System 2007 report compares New York's performance with national infection rate averages, and finds the state slightly below or slightly above these averages," Betsy McCaughey, chairwoman of the Committee to Reduce Infection Deaths and former lieutenant governor, said in a statement.

"But the only acceptable infection rate is zero. Hospitals that settle for being below average are dangerous places."

The state's department of health found that in surgical intensive care units, the rate of infections associated with a central line -- a tube into a major vein that allows doctors to administer medication or monitor patient condition -- was 3.7 for each 1,000 days that patients had such a hookup -- 4.8 out of 1,000 central lines in upstate facilities.

"The national rate in 2007 was 2.7 infections for each 1,000 days, meaning that New York patients had a 37 percent greater chance of infection than the national average," McCaughey said.

"Beth Israel Medical Center in New York City hasn't had a central line infection in the cardiac intensive care unit in over 950 days," he said. "Not one."