A study was undertaken to assess the utility of the xTAG respiratory viral panel (RVP) for enhanced laboratory investigation of respiratory outbreaks. Specimens (n = 1,108) from 244 suspected respiratory virus outbreaks in 2006 and 2007 in Alberta, Canada, were included in the study. Testing by direct fluorescent antigen detection (DFA) and various in-house nucleic acid amplification tests (NAT...

As part of an intensified monitoring program for foodborne disease outbreaks in Finland, waterborne outbreaks were investigated for viruses. The diagnostic procedure included analysis of patients' stool samples by electron microscopy and reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) for noroviruses and astroviruses. When these test results were positive for a virus, the water sample ...

Enteric infections Outbreaks of suspected foodborne disease Nine outbreaks of gastrointestinal disease, thought to be due to the consumption of contaminated food and which affected a total of 64 people, were reported for January and February 2012. This is half as many outbreaks reported for the same period last year. These outbreaks were linked to restaurants or cafes (7), a private residence (...

A minimal model for the interactions of trees, insects, and their enemies suggests a simple formula for splitting all forests where insect outbreaks can occur into two categories: where outbreaks are periodic and endogenously generated and where outbreaks are triggered by exogenous factors and are, in general, recurrent but aperiodic. The formula is in full agreement with all field studies in w...

All outbreaks of infectious intestinal disease reported to the authorities were entered on a computer database with outbreak control teams being established to investigate larger or more significant incidents. The outbreak database and, when set up, the notes of outbreak team meetings were examined for the 279 outbreaks reported in a three-year period (2003-2005). Faeces specimens submitted as ...

BACKGROUND There are frequent reports of intensive care unit (ICU) outbreaks due to transmission of particular antibiotic-resistant bacteria. Less is known about the burden of outbreaks of resistance due to horizontal transfer of mobile genetic elements between species. Moreover, the potential of existing statistical software as a preliminary means for detecting such events has never been asses...

BACKGROUND In the military, outbreaks of infectious diarrhea pose a significant health problem. In this descriptive analysis of data collected by the IDF on all infectious diarrhea outbreaks between 1988-2011, we analysed temporal, seasonal, and unit-type trends in 1,192 diarrheal outbreaks in the Israel Defence Forces (IDF) over a 24-year period, and described the long-term trends in seasonali...