Reoccurrence of botulinum neurotoxin subtype A3 inducing food-borne botulism, Slovakia, 2015.

ABSTRACT: A case of food-borne botulism occurred in Slovakia in 2015. Clostridium botulinum type A was isolated from three nearly empty commercial hummus tubes. The product, which was sold in Slovakia and the Czech Republic, was withdrawn from the market and a warning was issued immediately through the European Commission's Rapid Alert System for Food and Feed (RASFF). Further investigation revealed the presence of botulinum neurotoxin (BoNT) subtype BoNT/A3, a very rare subtype implicated in only one previous outbreak (Loch Maree in Scotland, 1922). It is the most divergent subtype of BoNT/A with 15.4% difference at the amino acid level compared with the prototype BoNT/A1. This makes it more prone to evading immunological and PCR-based detection. It is recommended that testing laboratories are advi

SUBMITTER: Mad'arova L 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6373608 | biostudies-literature | 2017 Aug

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature