Phenotypic and Genotypic Characterization of Salmonella enterica Serovar Enteritidis Isolates Associated with a Mousse Cake-Related Outbreak of Gastroenteritis in Ningbo, China.

Salmonella enterica subsp. enterica serovar Enteritidis (Salmonella Enteritidis) is a major pathogen responsible for causing the largest number of sporadic cases and outbreaks of human salmonellosis worldwide. In this study, an outbreak of Salmonella Enteritidis involving 112 cases in Ningbo, China was investigated with a combination of genotypic subtyping methods and phenotypic analysis. The pulsed-field gel electrophoresis and multilocus variable-number tandem-repeat analysis profiles showed that most of the outbreak clinical isolates (22/23) were indistinguishable from each other and were identical to the isolates obtained from implicated mousse cakes, demonstrating that this outbreak of gastroenteritis was caused by Salmonella Enteritidis-contaminated mousse cakes. Moreover, all isolates, irrespective of source, had an identical antibiotic susceptibility pattern. Five virulence-associated genes in Salmonella pathogenicity islands and the plasmid-associated virulence genes spvB/C were present in both the food and clinical isolates. Importantly, all of these isolates can survive well under low-temperature treatment, indicating that manufacturers of foodstuffs with raw ingredients (not subjected to thermal processing) should use an effective approach to prevent or eliminate the microbial hazards to public health.