Salmonellosis
Cases
= 572Crude rate
(per 100,000 population) = 10.3Age-adjusted race-specific rates
(per 100,000 population)White = 6.3
Nonwhite = 7.1
Gender-specific rate
s (per 100,000 population)Female = 9.9
Male = 10.6
Salmonellosis is a bacterial disease usually transmitted through raw or undercooked foods of animal origin or foods cross-contaminated by animal products or feces. It can also be transmitted person-to-person.
There are over 2300 different Salmonella serotypes that differ in somatic and flagellar antigens. The ISDH requests that clinical laboratories submit all positive Salmonella isolates to the ISDH Laboratories for free confirmation and serotyping. During 1999, serotypes were determined for 72% of the reported Salmonella cases. Figure 1 shows the distribution of Salmonella serotypes from initial and reference specimens submitted to the ISDH Enterics Laboratory. Of the 474 Salmonella isolates of known serotype, 135 (28%) were typhimurium (including 45 that were Copenhagen variant), 70 (15%) were enteritidis, 49 (10%) were heidelberg, 39 (8%) were newport, 22 (5%) were java, and the remaining 159 (34%) were other serotypes.
Figure 1.
Incidence of salmonellosis in Indiana decreased slightly with 572 cases being reported (Figure 2). The incidence was greatest during the late spring and summer months (Figure 3).
Figure 2.
Figure 3.
There was little difference in the rates of salmonellosis by race or sex. Overall age-specific rates were greatest among infants (57.8) followed by preschoolers (15.9) (Figure 4).
Figure 4.
Among counties with at least 5 reported cases, incidence rates of salmonellosis were greatest in Adams (35.4), Scott (28.6), Dubois (27.3), Steuben (25.5) and White (21.5) counties (Figure 5).
Figure 5.
The ISDH investigated one outbreak of salmonellosis in 1999. In July, 13 cases of Salmonella Heidelberg were linked to a Martin County restaurant. These outbreaks are described in more detail in Appendix C.
In response to increasing numbers of multi-drug resistant Salmonella typhimurium DT104 in Europe and parts of the US, the ISDH Enteric Laboratory screens all S. typhimurium isolates for resistance to those antibiotics for which the European DT104 strain commonly shows resistance. These include ampicillin, chloramphenicol, streptomycin, sulfonamides, and tetracycline (R-type: ACSSuT). Of the 135 S. typhimurium isolates examined, 41 (30%) of the isolates were R-type: ACSSuT (See Figure 6).
Figure 6.
