A Salmonella outbreak has affected greater than 200 folks in Europe, the UK and the US.
The Salmonella Virchow outbreak started in June 2017 and most circumstances have been linked to native eating places serving kebab meat. At the least one particular person in the US had gotten sick. A affected person from California had a historical past of touring to Paris in 2019 and required hospital therapy.
The European Heart for Illness Prevention and Management (ECDC) and the European Meals Security Authority (EFSA) stated the variety of confirmed circumstances represents solely a small proportion of all infections in Europe, partly resulting from differing capacities. nation sequencing.
A complete of 210 circumstances have been reported: 111 in France, 34 within the Netherlands, 32 within the UK, 26 in Germany, 4 in Eire, two in Denmark and one within the USA.
Kebab meat merchandise containing contaminated hen are the potential automobiles for infections, and the bacterium has been circulating within the EU poultry meat manufacturing chain in France, Germany, Eire and the Netherlands.
Among the many circumstances interviewed, 10 folks had been hospitalized in Germany, 5 in France, 4 in Eire and two in the UK. No deaths have been reported. Sufferers vary in age from lower than 1 to 92 years, with a median age of 22 to 80 years, relying on the nation.
Johanna Takkinen, ECDC Lead Skilled on Meals and Waterborne Ailments, stated: “ECDC encourages nations to sequence Salmonella Virchow isolates of human infections acquired within the nation and interview circumstances with Salmonella Virchow sequence sort 16 infections. Investigations ought to deal with the consumption of poultry meat and associated merchandise and be carried out in shut collaboration with meals security authorities.”
New infections within the EU are prone to have an effect on all age teams till additional analysis identifies the sources and factors of contamination alongside the hen meat manufacturing chain, the ECDC and EFSA stated.
Peak of infections on the finish of 2022
In January 2023, France reported 52 circumstances of Salmonella Virchow an infection between August and December 2022 to the European infectious illness surveillance portal, referred to as EpiPulse. Within the following weeks, Denmark, Germany, the Netherlands, the UK and the US reported circumstances belonging to the identical microbiological group. The French outbreak pressure is genetically much like a earlier multi-country outbreak of Salmonella Virchow within the Netherlands in 2020, with hen meat because the suspected car of an infection.
The information exhibits spikes in a number of nations at irregular intervals since 2017, with the very best peak within the final quarter of 2022. The newest circumstances had been reported in France and the Netherlands in February 2023.
A French outbreak in 2022 was linked to native kebab eating places in a single area. Forty-two sick folks had been concerned. In 2021, an outbreak attributable to the identical pressure was related to a kebab restaurant in a special area.
In France, a questionnaire discovered consumption of kebabs with hen meat, within the days previous to the onset of signs, in 19 of 24 interviewed circumstances, and 14 cited the identical kebab outlet in a area.
5 French eating places had obtained kebab meat from totally different German suppliers and one Polish firm. A number of the German corporations concerned obtained uncooked supplies from Belgian, Italian, Dutch and Polish corporations. The outbreak pressure was additionally detected in French broiler farms.
Lack of expertise, corresponding to batch numbers, meant the function of kebab product producers, their meat suppliers and the potential involvement of different operators, as sources of infections couldn’t be established or dominated out, ECDC and EFSA.
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