LAUSR

Salmonella Aberdeen is a ubiquitous pathogen that can cause severe gastroenteritis and plays an important role in food-borne illness and international food-trade dispute. However, the molecular biological characteristics of this organism have been rarely studied. This study was conducted in accordance with the Declaration of Helsinki and aimed to assess the epidemiological and clinical characteristics of a food-borne outbreak caused by Salmonella Aberdeen. Furthermore, the molecular biological characteristics of the outbreak isolates were detected and analyzed. From June 10 to 12, 2018, an enteritis outbreak affected 75 employees in the Fushan district of Yantai, Shandong province, China, including 33males and 42 females. The mean age of the patients was 34.2± 5.3 years. An epidemiological investigation revealed that all infected employees had eaten the lunch provided by a catering company on June 9, 2018. In total, 22 samples, including four feces samples, five surplus food samples, eight cooking utensils used by the catering company, and five samples of chicken and eggs from themarket where the food raw materials were purchased, were collected. Of the 22 samples, six (27.2%) were tested positive for Salmonella Aberdeen (O11:Hi;1,2), including three isolates from feces (3/4, 75%) and three from surplus foods (3/5, 60%). Pulsed-field gel electrophoresis (PFGE) results showed the highly close correlation among the isolates, which were digested using the restriction enzyme nucleases XbaI (96.8%) and BlnI (100%) (Takara, Dalian, Liaoning, China) according to the PulseNet standardized PFGE protocol. The PFGE patterns were analyzed using BioNumerics, Version 6.0 (Applied Maths, Kortrijk, Belgium).