No isolation of Escherichia coli O157:H7 strains from faecal specimens of Turkish children with acute gastroenteritis.

Several strains of Escherichia coli that produce relatively large amounts of cytotoxin active on Vero or HeLa cell, termed as verocytotoxin, are recognized as important aetiological agents of diarrhoea in children, particularly in developed countries. Most of these recognized E. coli strains belong to serotype O157:H7. This organism, first isolated in the USA in 1982, has been associated with both outbreaks and sporadic cases of human disease, ranging from uncomplicated diarrhoea to haemorrhagic colitis and haemolytic-uraemic syndrome in North America (1,2). The reported frequency of E. coli O157:H7 infections continues to increase, probably reflecting both a greater interest in this pathogen and a real increase in its incidence and geographic spread (3,4). To the best of our knowledge, no information on the prevalence of E. coli O157:H7 in Turkish population is available.