Abstract
Once a year, countries that collaborate in the European Surveillance Scheme for Travel Associated Legionnaires' Disease (EWGLINET) are requested to submit a dataset that provides epidemiological and microbiological information on cases of legionnaires' disease (nosocomial (hospital-acquired), community and travel related) detected in their country for that year. This paper presents the data collected for 2003 and 2004. For this period, 9166 cases were reported to the dataset by 35 countries, of which 941 cases were associated with outbreaks. Fourteen countries reported a total of 218 detected outbreaks. National infection rates varied between countries from 28.7 to less than one case per million population. This information is valuable in that it allows countries to assess the effectiveness of their national surveillance schemes in detecting cases. Over the two year period, 748 cases were reported to have died, giving a case fatality rate of 8.2%. The lack of detailed epidemiological information on deaths from legionnaires' disease is highlighted. The establishment of the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control is seen as an opportunity to develop European collaborations more fully, and to increase further the protection of Europeans from outbreaks of legionnaires' disease.
Highlights
The twelfth meeting of the European Working Group on Legionella Infections (EWGLI), which was co-sponsored by WHO, was held in Lisbon, on 1-3 June 1997
Information on cases of Legionnaires' disease in Europe was obtained through the completed annual reporting forms prepared by the Public Health Laboratory Service (PHLS) Communicable Disease Surveillance Centre (CDSC)
The number of deaths reported in 1996 was 77, an overall case fatality rate of 4.9% compared with 7.7% in 1995
Summary
There is a real willingness to develop a European strategy for typing Legionella spp. New techniques to type Legionella at the level of the species or the subspecies were presented. In this respect, the panel of monoclonal antibodies to serotype Legionella pneumophila described at the meeting will be very helpful in limiting the number of strains that cross-react with antisera. Other taxonomic techniques that were presented included the analysis of the fatty acid or lipopolysaccharide composition For these studies it appears important to exchange strains between laboratories to obtain a maximum number of strains for each species and not to limit the evaluation of a new technique to a single reference strain. It is important that unusual features and observations on the clinical presentation and of the epidemiology of legionella infections are reported in order to increase understanding of this disease
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Schedule a callMore From: Euro surveillance : bulletin Europeen sur les maladies transmissibles = European communicable disease bulletin
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