Hepatitis C virus antibodies in patients on hemodialysis.

To the Editor: Recently, several outbreaks of nosocomial infection and pseudoinfection linked to endoscopes contaminated during cleaning and disinfection by automated reprocessing machines have been summarized. Some automated endoscope reprocessing machines have the potential to become colonized with heterotrophic organisms, and this occurred between 1988 and 1990 in two machines manufactured by the Olympus Corporation (EW-10 and Auto-disinfector 2). At least three factors contributed to the problem. The design of the machines hampered their cleaning and decontamination, the detergent, disinfectant, and tap water were reused several times, and reservoirs and tubing of both machines remained moist or filled with fluid for extended periods, providing several sources for contamination and for recontamination during rinsing. All these problems have been described in 1985 in the German literature.2 Shortly after this report, Olympus Germany stopped marketing the EW-10 model. I consider it unfair, to say the least, that Olympus Corporation did not inform users in other countries in order to prevent possible life-threatening infections. It took almost five years (until April 1990) for the Olympus Corporation, at the request of the Food and Drug Administration, to mail a medical device safety alert to all consignees of EW-10. As the old L&ins say, “pecunia non olet.” F.D. Daschner, MD University Hospital Freiburg, Germany