The Comment on community-acquired meticillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA; Sept 2, p 824) is very timely. Until now our attention has been focused on controlling MRSA in hospitals, with little concern about the circulation of these strains between hospitals and the community, or about threats posed by new MRSA strains with enhanced virulence emerging in the community. In response to this, the International Scientific Forum on Home Hygiene (IFH) has produced a report assessing MRSA, Clostridium difficile, and Escherichia coli that produce extended-spectrum β-lactamases from a community viewpoint. The report summarises what is known about their prevalence and mode of transmission in the home and community. It outlines a risk-management approach to hygiene in order to break the chain of transmission, together with advice sheets for use by health professionals to give guidance to the public on what to do where there is risk.In reality, MRSA is only one of the reasons why we need to persuade the public to share the responsibility for infection control and adopt better standards of day-to-day hygiene. Other reasons include the continuing high levels of infectious intestinal disease, the increasing elderly population, shorter hospital stays (meaning greater numbers of vulnerable people in the community), and the emergence of severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) and avian influenza. To achieve this shared responsibility, however, we need to abandon our fragmented approach to hygiene promotion, whereby food hygiene advice is given separately from advice on care of the sick or prevention of influenza, and adopt a concerted approach that looks at hygiene from the point of view of the family and the range of problems that they face in protecting themselves from infection.