Search results for " outbreak"
showing 10 items of 640 documents
Quantitative detection of viable foodborne E. coli O157:H7, Listeria monocytogenes and Salmonella in fresh-cut vegetables combining propidium monoazi…
2012
Abstract The increase of foodborne outbreaks associated with fresh vegetables has highlighted the importance of developing rapid and specific methods for the detection and quantification of foodborne pathogens. In this sense, real-time PCR (qPCR) fulfills these requirements although it may detect dead cells. Recently, a potential strategy to specifically detect viable cells has been proposed relying on the use of DNA binding molecules as sample pretreatment previous to the qPCR. In this study propidium monoazide (PMA) and reagent D, combined with qPCR, were evaluated for the detection and quantification of viable Escherichia coli O157:H7, Salmonella and Listeria monocytogenes. Initially, th…
Drought-related cholera outbreaks in Africa and the implications for climate change: a narrative review.
2021
ABSTRACT Africa has historically seen several periods of prolonged and extreme droughts across the continent, causing food insecurity, exacerbating social inequity and frequent mortality. A known consequence of droughts and their associated risk factors are infectious disease outbreaks, which are worsened by malnutrition, poor access to water, sanitation and hygiene and population displacement. Cholera is a potential causative agent of such outbreaks. Africa has the highest global cholera burden, several drought-prone regions and high levels of inequity. Despite this, research on cholera and drought in Africa is lacking. Here, we review available research on drought-related cholera outbreak…
Evidence of autochthonous transmission of urinary schistosomiasis in Almeria (southeast Spain): An outbreak analysis.
2021
Abstract Background Schistosomiasis is endemic in 78 countries belonging to tropical and subtropical areas. However, autochthonous transmission of urogenital schistosomiasis was reported in Corsica (France) in 2013. We present evidence of autochthonous transmission of urogenital schistosomiasis in Almeria (Spain) in 2003. Methods Description of the outbreak in farmers and subsequent epidemiological studies aimed at searching for Bulinus snails and their genotypic characteristics. Results The outbreak affected 4 farmers out of a group of 5 people who repeatedly bathed that summer in an irrigation pool in the area. Two of them presented macroscopic hematuria with bilharziomas, showing the pre…
Analysis of the Overdispersed Clock in the Short-Term Evolution of Hepatitis C Virus: Using the E1/E2 Gene Sequences to Infer Infection Dates in a Si…
2006
Abstract The assumption of a molecular clock for dating events from sequence information is often frustrated by the presence of heterogeneity among evolutionary rates due, among other factors, to positively selected sites. In this work, our goal is to explore methods to estimate infection dates from sequence analysis. One such method, based on site stripping for clock detection, was proposed to unravel the clocklike molecular evolution in sequences showing high variability of evolutionary rates and in the presence of positive selection. Other alternatives imply accommodating heterogeneity in evolutionary rates at various levels, without eliminating any information from the data. Here we pre…
Potentially human-virulent Vibrio vulnificus isolates from diseased great pompano (Trachinotus goodei).
2019
Vibrio vulnificus is an opportunistic human pathogen responsible for the majority of seafood-associated deaths worldwide and is also a relevant fish pathogen for the aquaculture industry. In addition to infections in aquatic livestock, V. vulnificus also represents a risk to aquarium animals. For the first time, this work describes an important mortality outbreak in Trachinotus goodei in a zoo aquarium, with the isolation of Vibrio vulnificus (Vv) from the internal organs of the diseased fish. The isolates were identified by MALDI-TOF MS, serotyped and characterized by pulsed-field gel electrophoresis (PFGE). Although the isolates from great pompanos did not belong to pathovar piscis (forme…
Reinterpreting a community outbreak of Salmonella enterica serotype Enteritidis in the light of molecular typing
2007
Abstract Background In November 2005, a large outbreak due to Salmonella enterica serotype Enteritidis (S. Enteritidis) was observed within children who had eaten their meals at 53 school cafeterias in Florence and the surrounding area. A total of 154 isolates of S. Enteritidis were recovered from human cases between November 2005 and January 2006. All strains were assigned phage type 8 (PT8) and a common XbaI pulsotype. This paper reports the findings of a molecular epidemiological investigation performed on 124 strains of S. Enteritidis isolated in the years 2005 and 2006 in Florence and the surrounding area, including the epidemic isolates. Methods One hundred twenty-four human isolates …
Phage types and ribotypes of Salmonella enteritidis in southern Italy.
1996
Differently from other European countries, Southern Italy was affected by a considerable increase in human infections due to Salmonella enterica subsp. enterica serovar Enteritidis (S. Enteritidis) only after 1990. On the present investigation, two groups of S. Enteritidis strains isolated during the low-incidence period 1980-1984 and the epidemic period 1990-1993, respectively, have been submitted to phage-typing and ribotyping in order to ascertain whether the epidemic increase was determined by the spread of a foreign bacterial clone or not. Among the 150 isolates relative to the aforesaid two periods, 12 different phage types (PTs) were observed. PT4 was the most common phage type among…
Pheno-genotyping of Salmonella enterica serotype Enteritidis isolates identified in Sicily during a reemergence period.
2005
After an upward trend paralleling that occurring in most European countries, including Italy, since October 2002 Salmonella enterica serotype Enteritidis (S. Enteritidis) has again gained the first position among outbreak and sporadic human isolates of Salmonella in Sicily. Because phage typing of S. Enteritidis has many technical and epidemiological limitations and molecular methods have proved to be poorly discriminative for this organism, multiple typing, using phage typing together with pulsed field gel electrophoresis (PFGE) and plasmid profiling on a sample of fifty human and poultry isolates identified during the period October 2002 to May 2003 in Sicily, was chosen as the most valua…
Vibrio vulnificus serovar A: an emerging pathogen in European anguilliculture.
2006
The spread of the emerging pathogen Vibrio vulnificus biotype 2 serovar A in Danish anguilliculture is reported. Serovar A was originally isolated in a Spanish eel farm in 2000 and occurred in Denmark in the summer of 2004, affecting eels of 5-10 g body weight cultured in fresh water. The Danish eels showed clinical signs different from those reported for Spanish eels, such as severe haemorrhages in the head and gill region with necrosis of the soft tissues. Danish isolates were biochemically and serologically identical to Spanish serovar A strains and also highly virulent for eels by both intraperitoneal injection and immersion challenges. Vaccination with Vulnivaccine, a vaccine against V…
Identification of the novel Kawasaki 2014 GII.17 human norovirus strain in Italy, 2015
2015
Surveillance of noroviruses in Italy identified the novel GII.17 human norovirus strain, Kawasaki 2014, in February 2015. This novel strain emerged as a major cause of gastroenteritis in Asia during 2014/15, replacing the pandemic GII.4 norovirus strain Sydney 2012, but being reported only sporadically elsewhere. This novel strain is undergoing fast diversification and continuous monitoring is important to understand the evolution of noroviruses and to implement the future strategies on norovirus vaccines.