Salmonella birkenhead: A New Salmonella Type Causing Food-Poisoning in Man.

Of the nine cases, seven gave a history typical of acute gastro-enteritis; one had enteritis only, and the last patient, who was investigated for reasons not relevant to the present paper, was a symptomless excretor of the organism. The patients with gastroenteritis complained of sudden onset of the disease with headache, abdominal pain, vomiting, and diarrhoea, and all showed some rise in temperature. The eighth case, a child, had similar symptoms except that she never vomited. Three patients were sufficiently ill to be admitted to hospital, one of them being described by her doctor as having symptoms suggestive of enteric fever. A fourth patient had been in hospital for six weeks with cardiac disease when he suddenly complained of diarrhoea; this case terminated fatally after a two-day illness, but it is impossible to say how far the Salmonella infection may have contributed to the fatal issue. The findings are summarized in Table I.