This study describes all episodes of invasive meningococcal disease (n=120) acquired in north Queensland over the 5 year period 1995 to 1999. Indigenous people had a 3-fold greater risk than others of acquiring invasive meningococcal disease. There were 7 deaths, six in non-indigenous people. The majority (72.4%) of identified isolates were serogroup B. We found no evidence of significant resis...

Environmental monitoring and clinical surveillance for Legionella species were done for 12 months as recommended by the Allegheny County Health Department (Pittsburgh). The water system of a hospital was found to be colonized with Legionella pneumophila serogroup 5. Three patients with nosocomial L. pneumophila serogroup 5 disease were subsequently diagnosed after laboratory tests for legionell...

The prevalence and serogroups of Salmonella recovered following air chilling were determined for both enriched neck skin and matching enriched whole carcass samples. Commercially processed and eviscerated carcasses were air chilled to 4°C before removing the neck skin (8.3 g) and stomaching in 83 mL buffered peptone water. The remaining carcass was subjected to whole carcass enrichment in 500 m...

Three strains of Legionella feeleii from patients with pneumonia (425-MI-H, 691-WI-H, and 693-WI-H) and one environmental strain (713-MI-E) received at the Centers for Disease Control for reference diagnostic testing were compared with the type strain WO-44C-C3 (ATCC 35072) by DNA hybridization, chemical analysis of cellular fatty acids and ubiquinones, biochemical tests, and serological charac...

A study sample of 7,010 episodes of invasive Streptococcus pneumoniae disease was obtained by combining 13 existing datasets. Disease episodes due to each of 12 pneumococcal serogroups (1, 3-9, 14, 18, 19, and 23) were then compared with episodes in a constant internal control group to describe serogroup-specific variations in disease frequency by age, sex, and geographic origin. The results ar...

UNLABELLED The structures of Streptococcus pneumoniae capsular polysaccharides (CPSs) are essential for defining the antigenic as well as genetic relationships between CPS serotypes. The four serotypes that comprise CPS serogroup 35 (i.e., types 35F, 35A, 35B, and 35C) are known to cross-react with genetically related type 20, 29, 34, 42, or 47F. While the structures of CPS serotype 35A (CPS35A...

BACKGROUND The conjugate vaccine against serogroup A Neisseria meningitidis (NmA), MenAfriVac, was first introduced in mass vaccination campaigns of the 1-29-year-olds in Burkina Faso in 2010. The aim of this study was to genetically characterize meningococcal isolates circulating in Burkina Faso before and up to 13 months after MenAfriVac mass vaccination. METHODS A total of 1,659 meningococ...

Rectal fecal samples were taken once a week from 49 calves on the same farm. In addition, the dams of the calves were sampled at the time of calf birth and at the end of the study. Strains of verocytotoxin-producing Escherichia coli (VTEC) were isolated from these samples by using PCR and DNA probe hybridization tests and were characterized with respect to serotype, verocytotoxin gene (vtx) typ...

BACKGROUND College students living in residential halls are at increased risk of meningococcal disease. Unlike that for serogroups prevented by quadrivalent meningococcal vaccines, public health response to outbreaks of serogroup B meningococcal disease is limited by lack of a US licensed vaccine. METHODS In March 2010, we investigated a prolonged outbreak of serogroup B disease associated wi...

Genomic diversity of Listeria monocytogenes isolates from the deboning and slicing areas three dry-cured ham processing plants was analysed. L. detected in 58 out 491 samples environment equipment surfaces, all area, with differences prevalence among facilities. The most frequent PCR-serogroup IIa (74.1%) followed by IIb IIc, only one isolate serogroup IVb. Twenty different pulsotypes 11 sequen...