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Publication Details
AFRICAN RESEARCH NEXUS
SHINING A SPOTLIGHT ON AFRICAN RESEARCH
immunology and microbiology
Fatal type A botulism in South Africa, 2002
Transactions of the Royal Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene, Volume 98, No. 5, Year 2004
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Description
Although wildfowl and domestic livestock botulism has been recognized as a problem in southern Africa, very few human cases have ever been described in the region. In late February 2002, two siblings aged eight and 12 years developed acute flaccid paralysis and died. Mouse bioassays revealed the presence of type A botulinum toxin in the serum of both children, and in the retrieved remains of the implicated food. The implicated vehicle of the toxin was tinned fish in tomato sauce, commercially produced in South Africa. Type A Clostridium botulinum was cultured from the food. The most likely scenario was that corrosion damage had allowed entry of environmental organisms, including Clostridium botulinum , to the tinned food. This is the first outbreak of human type A botulism in southern Africa to be documented, and the first fatal outbreak described; previous human cases in this region have involved type B botulinum toxin, which tends to produce milder disease. A few other outbreaks elsewhere in Africa have been published, the most extensive being a type E epidemic in Egypt. Commercially tinned products were not involved in any of those outbreaks. © 2004 Royal Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Authors & Co-Authors
Frean, John Andrew
South Africa, Johannesburg
University of the Witwatersrand
Arntzen, Lorraine
South Africa, Johannesburg
University of the Witwatersrand
van den Heever, Johann
South Africa, Marshalltown
Public Health Programmes
Perovic, Olga
South Africa, Johannesburg
University of the Witwatersrand
Statistics
Citations: 24
Authors: 4
Affiliations: 2
Identifiers
Doi:
10.1016/S0035-9203(03)00069-5
ISSN:
00359203
Research Areas
Food Security
Health System And Policy
Maternal And Child Health
Study Locations
Egypt
South Africa