LEXINGTON, Ky. (AP) - Health officials are trying to determine whether nine high school students and a jail inmate in Kentucky have contracted a strain of antibiotic resistant staph infections.

The infections have gotten renewed attention in recent years with escalating reports of MRSA, a "superbug" that is associated with horrible skin infections but also causes blood infections, pneumonia and other illnesses.

The principal at Lafayette High School in Lexington sent a letter to parents, saying a parent e-mailed him over the weekend to tell him that a student had been diagnosed with MRSA. The school system said the diagnosis hasn't been confirmed, but schools are reacting as though it had been to prevent any spread of infection.

Officials at Ryle High School in northern Kentucky's Boone County sent a letter to parents on Monday saying that eight students have been diagnosed with staph infections, but they don't know if it is the drug-resistant bacteria.

Meanwhile, an inmate at the Woodford County jail in central Kentucky who underwent surgery on two large open sores Monday told the Lexington Herald-Leader by telephone that a doctor told him he had a staph infection.

In northern Kentucky, the letter sent to parents said each of the infected children was under the care of a doctor and school officials were staying in contact with parents.

"The sources of these infections have not been determined and we have no knowledge if the infections are related or that they were picked up at school," the letter said. "We are taking steps to clean and sanitize common areas of the building above and beyond the normal cleaning procedures that occur on a regular basis."

In Woodford County, Jailer Gary Gilkison said he's working with the county health department.

"I've already decontaminated everything just as a precaution," Gilkison said. "We want to stop it before it gets out of hand."

Inmate David Shaw, 31, is nearing the end of a six-month sentence on a charge of being a convicted felon in possession of a handgun. Shaw said he has two big sores, one on his left thigh and another on the back of his right thigh.

"They're about as big as an Oreo cookie or bigger," Shaw said.

Gilkison said jail and county officials are "making sure that we're doing everything we need to do" regarding cleanliness for the 67 inmates at the jail as of Monday.

"Obviously it's a public health concern," said Garland VanZant, director of the Woodford County Health Department. "Nobody wants any more people exposed to it, and we need to make sure the jail is taking proper precautions, if indeed it is staph."

(Copyright 2007 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)