Staphylococcus aureus bloodstream infections (SAB also called S. aureus, or ‘golden staph’) associated with healthcare can be serious, particularly when they are resistant to common antimicrobials.
In 2017–18, all states and territories had public hospital SAB rates below the national benchmark of 2.0 cases per 10,000 patient days.
Between 2013–14 and 2015–16, the SAB rate decreased from 0.89 to 0.74 cases per 10,000 patient days. It has remained around this level since (0.76 in 2016–17 and 0.73 in 2017–18).