An Norovirus Outbreak at a Local Festival in Chungnam Korea

Hyunah Lee; Donguk Kim; Seongmin Park; Jongjin Park; Hae-Sung Nam; Jinha Choi; Junhyuk Park

doi:10.4167/jbv.2019.49.2.81

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Lee, Kim, Park, Park, Nam, Choi, and Park: An Norovirus Outbreak at a Local Festival in Chungnam Korea

Original Article

Journal of Bacteriology and Virology 2019; 49(2): 81-88.

Published online: 30 June 2019

DOI: https://doi.org/10.4167/jbv.2019.49.2.81

An Norovirus Outbreak at a Local Festival in Chungnam Korea

Hyunah Lee^1,², Donguk Kim¹, Seongmin Park¹, Jongjin Park¹, Hae-Sung Nam³, Jinha Choi¹, Junhyuk Park¹

¹Department of Health Research, Chungcheongnam-Do Institute of Health and Environment Research, Hongseong, Korea.

²Department of Public Health, Chungnam National University Graduate School, Daejeon, Korea.

³Department of Preventive Medicine and Public Health, Chungnam National University, Daejeon, Korea.

Corresponding: Junhyuk Park. Chungcheongnam-Do Institute of Health and Environment Research, 8 Hongyegongwon-ro, Hongbuk-my eon, Hongseong, 32254, Korea. Phone: +82-41-635-6832, Fax: +82-41-635-7942, park.jun.hyuk.2019@gmail.com

Received 28 February 2019 Revised 8 May 2019 Accepted 8 May 2019

The Korean Society for Microbiology and The Korean Society of Virology

(open-access):

This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/3.0/).

Abstract

Noroviruses (NoV) are the major viral pathogen causing epidemic acute gastroenteritis and outbreaks of foodborne and waterborne illness. During the local festival in Chungnam province, group food poisoning occurred outbreak by NoV infections in Jan 2019. In this study, epidemiological analysis and molecular characterization were conducted such as genotyping, phylogeny. The prevalent genotypes of food poisoning events were NoV GII.3 and GII.17, and NoV GII.3 and GII.17 isolates of this study were completely matched in nucleotide sequence comparison of capsid gene region, respectively. In underground water and stream water, various multiple genotypes of noroviruses were detected including NoV GII.3, GII.8 and GI.4 in aquatic environment of the local festival site. Among 32 worker samples, various NoVs of five genotypes (GI.7, GI.8, GII.3, GII.8, GII.17) were detected in 12 samples and expected to causing NoV contaminated by exposure to groundwater. NoV genotype GII.3, which was detected from groundwater 2, was completely consistent with that of patients and workers. Therefore, groundwater within the local festival site could be main cause of food poisoning event. Because NoV outbreaks are caused by fecal to oral transmission, proper management of sewage purification facilities, groundwater and sanitary toilets is required for many visitors, and efforts are needed to maintain clean environment.

Keywords: norovirus outbreak, group food poisoning, groundwater contamination

Figures and Tables

Figure 1

Phylogenetic analysis of isolates in this study with reference strains for 254bp of capsid gene of norovirus GII.3

Figure 2

Phylogenetic analysis of isolates in this study with reference strains 255bp of capsid gene of for norovirus GII.17

Table 1

Norovirus GII.3 and GII.17 strains isolated in this study

Table 2

Exposed persons and patients with symptoms for norovirus infection

Table 3

Detection and distribution of genotypes of noroviruses in fecal samples of patients

Table 4

Detection and genotype distribution of noroviruses in fecal samples of food-service employees

Table 5

Detection and genotype distribution of noroviruses for groundwater, stream water and kitchen utensils

Notes

No potential conflict of interest relevant to this article was reported.

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