21.05.2014

Marzel et al., (2014) Journal Of Clinical Microbiology

Salmonella enterica is the leading etiologic agent of bacterial food-borne outbreaks worldwide. To characterize salmonellosis epidemiology in Israel and to study the association of nontyphoidal Salmonella (NTS) serovars with invasive infections, 48,345 Salmonella cases reported and serotyped at the National Salmonella Reference Center between 1995 and 2012 were analyzed. A quasi-Poisson regression was used to identify irregular clusters of illness, and pulsed-field gel electrophoresis in conjunction with whole-genome sequencing was applied to molecularly characterize strains of interest. 329 human salmonellosis clusters were identified, representing an annual average of 23 potential outbreaks. The researchers group show that the previously unsequenced S. enterica serovar 9,12:l,v:_belongs to the B clade of Salmonella enterica subspecies enterica, and has frequent association with extraintestinal infections, compared to other NTS serovars.
Accumulatively, these findings indicate a severe underreporting of Salmonella outbreaks in Israel and provide insights into the epidemiology and genomics of prevalent serovars, responsible for recurring illness.