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Coping with 23 days and nights in a cramped jail cell at the Lynwood Correction Facility may not be the only thing Paris Hilton has to worry about. A serious type of staph infection, MRSA, is spreading through the women's prison, where Paris is serving a sentence for violating her probation. For every 1,000 inmates, 13 will obtain some type of the infection caused by the staphylococcus bacteria; last year alone, 405 inmates in the facility came down with the staph infection.

Elizabeth Bancroft, an Epidemiologist for the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health, says of the seriousness of the disease: "MRSA is a kind of staph infection that means it's resistant to the first line of antibiotics we usually use to treat staph infection." She continues, "that is the kind that is so prevalent right now or so common in the jail."

According to Bancroft, it is impossible to get rid of MRSA because it is highly contagious, and because no vaccine exists. If the infection goes untreated, inflammation can occur and the disease could reach the bloodstream and bones. Once that happens, intravenous antibiotics are required for treatment.

The only upside for Hilton is that she is at less of a risk than the rest of her fellow inmates -- she is doing her time separate from the general population. Still, the one hour of free time she receives each day in contact with other inmates puts the heiress at risk.

It is vital for all inmates, including Paris, to "maintain good hygiene, wash hands and change clothes when laundry services come around," says Bancroft. Unfortunately for Paris, the laundry service at Lynwood doesn't do pleats.