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The difficulty of finding positive sources of infection, particularly
when information is received late in the department, is illustrated by
the small outbreak. The organism concerned was salmonella typhimurium.
The mother contracted diarrhoea one Thursday and her
husband and four month old baby on the following Sunday. Mother
and baby were both positive but the organism was not isolated from
the father's stools. The father of the second family in the same
house also had symptoms and the same organism was isolated. He
was a butcher and was excluded from work by the Medical Officer of
Health of the area where he worked until proved negative. As he
was a persistent carrier of salmonella infection he was admitted to
hospital after six weeks and fortunately was able to be discharged
fit to return to duty two weeks later. As information of this
outbreak was not received in the department until two weeks after
occurrence, it was quite impossible to obtain any sample of food or
hope to trace the source of infection.
The fatal case of food poisoning was caused by an organism
not usually met with in this country, namely, salmonella choleraesuis,
and the origin of infection could not be traced. The patient,
a butcher, had severe pain, diarrhoea and vomiting early one morning
and was admitted to hospital the following day. He had double
vision, fever and extreme prostration. He died a month later and
an inquest was held. The death was attributable to salmonella
septicaemia. The shop where this patient had worked was thoroughly
inspected and every effort made to trace any possible source of
infection but without avail. The patient had all his meals sent
from home and did not eat out at public restaurants.
Two children in one family were infected by s. Heidelberg in
June and as there had been other recent incidents of this infection in
south east England, a doctor from the Central Public Health Laboratory
at Colindale investigated these cases to ascertain any possible
association. The family of husband, wife and two sons stayed for
the week-end at their caravan in the country, taking all their food
from home. The two boys bathed in sewerage polluted water. The
day following their return the older son (13 years) developed fever,
abdominal pain and diarrhoea; he was admitted to hospital 3 days
later. The following day the younger brother (9 years) also became
ill. S. Heidelberg was isolated from the stools of both children
although neither parent was carrying the organisms. The source
of the infection was not found and there was no apparent association
with other recent incidents of s. Heidelberg infection in south east
England.
Dysentery Eighty-nine cases of dysentery were notified during the
year and in all cases where found, the causal organism
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