Salmonella Blog - Surveillance & analysis on salmonella news & outbreaks

Enterobacteria are a large heterogeneous group of gram-negative rods whose natural habitat is the intestinal tract of humans and animals. The family includes many genera, of which salmonella is one.

There are 1500 to 2000 types of salmonellae, with one type, S. typhi (typhoid fever), notorious, and another type, S. typhimurium, the most common enterocolitis (gastroenteritis) pathogen in the US.

Infections with most other types of salmonella, except for S. paratyphi, derive from environmental sources, principally poultry and livestock. Despite the frequency with which these organisms cause acute gastrointestinal illness, there are remarkably few documented examples of person-to-person spread. An outbreak in a day-care facility was associated with an uncertain number of secondary cases, and long-term surveillance of 54 permanent carriers of nontyphoidal salmonella identified 10 instances of transmitted infection.
 

The FDA says it still hasn't determined how tomatoes were tainted with salmonella before they sickened at least 429 convenience store customers in Pennsylvania, Maryland, West Virginia and Ohio.

In August, WBAL reports, Hurricane Charley wiped out some evidence when it struck Florida farms where the tomatoes were grown. Officials believe the tomatoes were likely tainted by animals that came into contact with the fruits at the farm level or in storage sheds.

Customers became ill after eating sandwiches from Sheetz convenience stores this past summer.

Bad publicity from the outbreak put a West Virginia produce supplier, Coronet Foods, out of business.
 

WNEP-TV
December 27, 2004

PITTSBURGH-The Food and Drug Administration says it still hasn't determined how tomatoes were tainted with salmonella before they sickened at least 429 Sheetz convenience store customers in Pennsylvania and neighboring states.

Hurricane Charley, which hit Florida in August, wiped out some evidence when it struck farms where the tomatoes were grown. Officials believe the tomatoes were likely tainted by animals that came into contact with the fruits at the farm level or in storage sheds.

In Pennsylvania, some 288 cases were linked to the outbreak.

The salmonella outbreak was the second large food-related illness outbreak in western Pennsylvania in as many years. Last fall, at least 660 people were sickened -- and at least four deaths were linked to a hepatitis A tainted green onions served at a Chi-Chi's restaurant in Beaver County.

There are still no answers as to what caused the Sheetz salmonella outbreak. The FDA said it still doesn`t know how the tomatoes were tainted with salmonella.

The FDA said Hurricane Charley wiped out any clues when it hit Florida tomato farms, reports NBC25 News.

Officials think animals probably contaminated the tomatoes. West Virginia-based Coronet Foods supplied the tomatoes to Sheetz and has since gone out of business.

More than 400 people in Pennsylvania, Maryland, West Virginia and Ohio said they got sick from eating the tomatoes.
 

Javier Ochoa Repraz defended his PhD thesis at the University of Navarre Faculty of Science on the development of an acellular vaccine aginst salmonella enteritidis. This involves a world pandemia considered to be the most importante zoonosis or illness/infection transmissible salmonellosis by animals to humans under natural conditions. It is estimated that the incidence of acute worldwide is more than a thousand million cases per annum and causes three million deaths.

The project developed by Javier Ochoa centred on the investigation of a new vaccine based on the encapsulation of the components of the Salmonella enteritidis cell sheath. The vaccine has shown itself to be efficacious in mice infected with this illness and is currently being employed on experimental farms of Hipra laboratories in Gerona, a company involved in the control of pathogens in birds.

In Spain, salmonella enteritidis is the bacteria that causes 85% of food-provoked gastroenteritis.
 

A salmonella outbreak that occurred almost a year ago in Steamboat Springs cost taxpayers almost $40,000 and cost individuals more than $66,000, not to mention a lot of upset stomachs.

Those were the estimates the Routt County Department of Environmental Health gave the City Council on Tuesday night when it presented calculations for the costs of the foodborne illness outbreak.

The outbreak occurred Dec. 16, 2003, at the Seasons at the Pond restaurant, and 51 cases of salmonella were reported in the weeks that followed. Those contaminated ranged from 4 to 72 years old, and 96 percent were Routt County residents.

A group of Steamboat Springs School District food service workers were among those infected. The cost of the infection to the individual was estimated at $1,300 per person.

Three of those infected were hospitalized. All those infected said they had diarrhea, 81 percent had abdominal pain and 75 percent had a fever, according to environmental health statistics. As bad as the outbreak was, it could have been worse, says Nadine Harrach with the environmental health department. The chain of contamination was broken early, it did not spread to any schools or to children through the food service workers, there was not a second wave of outbreaks, and no one died, she said.
 

Hand washing is one of the best ways to prevent the transmission of disease, especially during influenza season. Oklahoma public health officials are using National Hand Washing Awareness Week, Dec. 5-11, as an opportunity to remind people about this simple and inexpensive disease prevention technique.

"Hand washing helps prevent catching and spreading colds, hepatitis A, meningitis, and infectious diarrhea, as well as many other diseases," said Oklahoma State Department of Health Epidemiologist, Becky Coffman, RN, MPH. "The effective way to wash your hands is to wet your hands and apply liquid or clean bar soap. Rub your hands vigorously together for at least 10 to 15 seconds to dislodge and remove germs, and then rinse your hands well and dry them."

Public health officials advise you to wash your hands:

• Before, during and after you prepare food;
• Before you eat;
• Before you insert or remove contact lenses;
• After you use the bathroom or change a diaper;
• After handling uncooked foods, especially meat, poultry or fish;
• After handling animals or animal waste;
• After you blow your nose, cough or sneeze;
• After you handle garbage or dirty laundry;
• When your hands are dirty;
• More often when someone in your home is sick.

"You can infect yourself when you touch your eyes, nose or mouth after your hands have picked up germs from other sources such as people, uncooked foods or contaminated environmental areas," Coffman said. "One of the most common ways people catch colds is by rubbing their nose or their eyes after their hands have been contaminated with the cold virus."

A group of 67 county jail inmates have filed a lawsuit against the county claiming negligence in an outbreak of illness that followed the 2002 Thanksgiving meal in the jail. More than a third of the 719 inmates in jail on Nov. 28, 2002, reported symptoms of illness after that day's dinner.

An investigation by county and state officials tagged salmonella as the likely cause of the outbreak, reports the Daily News.

The lawsuit charges that jail officials knew of the unsafe condition beforehand, but did nothing to stop it.

The jail falls under the purview of the sheriff's office. Sheriff Gean Leonard said he could not comment on the particulars of the lawsuit because he had not seen it, but said deputies would never knowingly expose inmates to danger.