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A Northeast High School student was pulled from school and two athletics events were canceled Thursday because of a "super strain" of staph bacteria, which has caused some deaths of schoolchildren nationwide this year.

Called methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus, or MRSA, it's a stronger strain of what most call staph.

Guilford County Schools officials said Thursday they didn't know if the student picked up the infection from school or elsewhere. They said that student was not in school that afternoon.

The same strain of infection killed a 17-year-old student in Virginia this week. It is responsible for at least two other student deaths nationwide.

Guilford County Schools canceled a soccer match and a junior varsity football game between Page High School and East Forsyth High School on Thursday because of MRSA. East Forsyth is shaking off a MRSA infection that hit some of its football players this fall.

But plans are still on for tonight's varsity football game between the schools.

"Players have been asking if I've heard about it, and if the game is canceled," said Page football coach Kevin Gillespie, "and everything that everybody's telling me is that we're going to go."

At least six East Forsyth players have been infected since September, said Tim White, athletics director at East Forsyth.

There have been no new infections on the team in the past two weeks, he said.

Any players still infected will be benched for tonight's game, he said, unless a doctor has given them clearance to play.

The bacteria can spread through skin-to-skin contact — a big part of sports such as football and wrestling.

Locker rooms, jails and other confined spaces are common places for an outbreak, said Dr. Jeff Engel, epidemiologist for the state department of health. It can also spread by sharing razors and towels or by touching soiled bandages.

Engel said that MRSA is as widespread as the common cold, but has a resistance to "first line drugs" such as penicillin. So similar types of antibiotics are used to treat an infection.

"It's very common. It's a communitywide, ubiquitous organism," Engel said, adding that the N.C. Division of Public Health doesn't track the numbers of MRSA infections.

"We probably are dealing with an outbreak or a cluster every day," Engel said.

East Forsyth dealt with its outbreak by adding a weekend custodial shift to sanitize locker rooms.

"Generally, visiting teams don't use the locker rooms," White said.

Gillespie said quite a few parents phoned or sent e-mails to Page after learning that the next football opponent had several players with the infection.

Page locker rooms and football equipment are clean, Gillespie said.

"We wash their clothes daily, and our janitorial staff does a great job of sanitizing the locker room and keeping that area clean," he said.

Each season, hygiene and cleanliness are stressed in practice and in the locker room, he said.

On Thursday, the team was more concerned with football than an infection.

The teams are in the same athletics conference and undefeated in conference play.

"We can't let a little staph infection get in the way," said Erik Barnard, a senior wide receiver for Page.

Dequay Thigpen, a senior strong safety at Page, agreed.

"With or without the staph, we're going to execute plays," he said.

Staff writer Morgan Josey Glover contributed to this report.

Contact Gerald Witt at 382-8522, or gwitt@news-record.com