Staph and MRSA (CA-MRSA= community associated MRSA) are two names that you should know if you are wrestler, grappler, jiujitsu practioner or judoka… basically if you are rolling around with other people or coming in skin-to-skin contact.. you want to be wary of Staph.

From the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases:

MRSA
Also called: Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus

MRSA stands for methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus. It causes an infection that is resistant to several common antibiotics. There are two types of infection. Hospital-associated MRSA happens to people in healthcare settings. Community-associated MRSA happens to people who have close skin-to-skin contact with others, such as athletes involved in football and wrestling.

• Keep your hands clean by washing thoroughly with soap and water. Scrub them briskly for at least 15 seconds, then dry them with a disposable towel and use another towel to turn off the faucet. When you don’t have access to soap and water, carry a small bottle of hand sanitizer containing at least 62 percent alcohol.
• Always shower promptly after exercising.
• Keep cuts and scrapes clean and covered with a bandage until healed. Keep wounds that are draining or have pus covered with clean, dry bandages. Follow your healthcare provider’s instructions on proper care of the wound. Pus from infected wounds can contain S. aureus and MRSA, so keeping the infection covered will help prevent the spread to others. Bandages or tape can be discarded with regular trash.
• Avoid contact with other people’s wounds or bandages.
• Avoid sharing personal items, such as towels, washcloths, razors, clothes, or uniforms.
• Wash sheets, towels, and clothes that become soiled with water and laundry detergent; use bleach and hot water if possible. Drying clothes in a hot dryer, rather than air-drying, also helps kill bacteria in clothes.

CA-MRSA most often appears in the form of a skin or soft tissue infection, such as a boil or abscess. People with CA-MRSA often presume that they were bitten by a spider. The involved site is red, swollen, and painful and may have pus or other drainage. CA-MRSA also can cause more serious infections, such as bloodstream infections or pneumonia, leading to a variety of other symptoms including shortness of breath, fever, chills, and death.

You should pay attention to minor skin problems—pimples, insect bites, cuts, and scrapes—especially in children. If the wound appears to be infected, see a healthcare provider.

Here are some pictures of people with Staph/MRSA – http://images.google.com/images?q=staph+mrsa

Some history:

The S. aureus bacterium, commonly known as staph, was discovered in the 1880s. During this era, S. aureus infection commonly caused painful skin and soft tissue conditions such as boils, scalded-skin syndrome, and impetigo.
In the 1940s, medical treatment for S. aureus infections became routine and successful with the discovery and introduction of antibiotic medication, such as penicillin.

From that point on, however, use of antibiotics—including misuse and overuse—has aided natural bacterial evolution by helping the microbes become resistant to drugs designed to help fight these infections.

In the late 1940s and throughout the 1950s, S. aureus developed resistance to penicillin. Methicillin, a form of penicillin, was introduced to counter the increasing problem of penicillin-resistant S. aureus. Methicillin was one of most common types of antibiotics used to treat S. aureus infections; but, in 1961, British scientists identified the first strains of S. aureus bacteria that resisted methicillin. This was the so-called birth of MRSA.

MRSA is actually resistant to an entire class of penicillin-like antibiotics called beta-lactams. This class of antibiotics includes penicillin, amoxicillin, oxacillin, methicillin, and others.