TY - GEN T1 - Outbreak of wound botulism in injecting drug users AU - Schroeter, M. AU - Alpers, Katharina AU - Treeck, Ulrich van AU - Frank, Christina AU - Rosenkoetter, N. AU - Schaumann, R. AB - Between October and December 2005, 16 cases of wound botulism were notified to the health authorities of North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. All patients were injecting drug users (IDU) and the epidemiological investigations suggested contaminated injection drugs as the most probable source of infection. Clostridium botulinum was cultivated from clinical samples of six patients and molecular typing revealed that the different isolates were clonally identical. Two samples of heroin, one of them provided by a patient, were examined but C. botulinum could not be isolated. This outbreak demonstrates that IDU are at risk for acquiring wound botulism by injecting contaminated drugs. A greater awareness of this disease is needed by physicians and a close cooperation between public health authorities, street workers, operators of sheltered injecting facilities, and medical centres focusing on IDU is essential to prevent and manage outbreaks in IDU in a timely manner. KW - Adult KW - Humans KW - Female KW - Disease Outbreaks KW - Germany/epidemiology KW - Electrophoresis KW - Gel KW - Male KW - Middle Aged KW - Botulism/epidemiology KW - Botulism/genetics KW - Clostridium botulinum/genetics KW - Pulsed-Field KW - Heroin Dependence/microbiology KW - Substance Abuse KW - Intravenous/microbiology KW - Wound Infection/epidemiology KW - Wound Infection/microbiology KW - Young Adult KW - 610 Medizin PY - 2009 LA - eng PB - Robert Koch-Institut VL - 137 DO - 10.1017/S0950268809002544 ER -