Laboratory-based Surveillance of Water- and Food-borne Infectious Disease-causing Bacteria in the Republic of Korea, 2016-2018

Kim Nan-Ok, Hong Sahyun, Chun Jeong-Hoon, Hwang Kyu Jam
Division of Enteric Diseases, Center for Laboratory Control of Infectious Diseases, KCDC

Using the National Surveillance system, Enter-Net, this study was performed to characterize the pathogens responsible for causing diarrhea and to provide basic data, including epidemic disease patterns, for the prevention of diarrhea from 2016 to 2018. To identify the pathogenic bacteria, stool specimens from 29,717 patients with diarrhea were collected from January 2016 to December 2018 in Korea. Pathogenic bacteria were analyzed on the basis of the age and sex of the patients. Identification and analysis of the pathogens were conducted according to the principles of Laboratory Diagnosis of Infectious Diseases. Overall, 10 species and 29,717 strains of diarrhea-causing pathogenic bacteria were isolated from 4,436 stool specimens (14.9%). The isolation rate showed the highest ratio in summer, from June to October for most bacteria. On the basis of patient’s age, the isolation rate of most pathogenic bacteria showed the highest ratio for the range of 0-9 years. Hygiene education should be provided to diarrhea-susceptible groups, such as those aged < 10 years, and ≥ 70 years. Continuous monitoring of causative pathogens for water- and food-borne infectious diseases, through surveillance linked to local institutes and feedback of results are needed.

Keywords: Enter-Net, Surveillance, Diarrhea-causing bacteria, Bacterial Infections, Infectious disease, Infection control