Talk:Escherichia coli O104:H4

Designation incorrect
The serovar E. coli O104:H4 is not producing hemolysin und is not doing a hemolysis. The usage of HUS (Hemolytic-Uremic Syndrome) in conjunction with this strain is therefore not quite correct and irritating. I propose instead, and this is for general discussion with my colleagues in microbiology, the use of the shortening "nHUS" for "non-Hemolytic-Uremic Syndrome".

Hans-Hermann Spiess

Staatlich geprüfter Lebensmittelchemiker (Food Chemist)

Contact for direct discussion: hans-hermann.spiess@transia.de Hans-Hermann Spiess (talk) 14:08, 30 May 2011 (UTC)


 * I'm no expert, but seemingly reliable sources like ecdc and eurosurveillance identify the agent in the recent outbreak as O104 and say many patients contract HUS. The subtype O104:H4 is not mentioned in those two particular sources; does that explain the discrepancy?--Nø (talk) 14:51, 30 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Addition: Actually, another source by ecdc does identify the subtype as O104:H4 (though as far as I understand, this has not been confirmed for all cases).--Nø (talk) 15:57, 30 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Sadly, we have to follow the sources. Speciate (talk) 18:10, 1 June 2011 (UTC)
 * The question is solved. Thanks to the colleagues. Hans-Hermann Spiess (talk) 17:36, 11 June 2011 (UTC)


 * The term "Hemolytic Uremic Syndrom" relates to a clinical syndrom. It is used by medical doctors to describe the symptoms of a patient suffering from a severe illness. There is no doubt that the current German outbreak strain causes the illness named HUS. Accordingly the outbreak strain is classified as HUSEC. A different question is, whether the outbreak strain is carrying the gene hlyA which encodes a protein called hemolysin A. The gene hlyA is often found in EHEC, but not always. There are many hemolysin genes know to occur in E.coli and hlyA is only one of them. Whether a strain is called EHEC depends on the intimin gene eae. The current outbreak strain does not have an eae gene and thus it is not classified as EHEC, please see the (german) report published by the referecence laboratory for HUS. Finally, the outbreak strain is carrying a gene cluster encoding shigatoxin 2. This gene cluster is known to reside on a bacteriophage (eg a mobil genetic element). Isolates producing shigatoxin are classified as STEC. Peter Slickers (talk) 16:40, 13 June 2011 (UTC)
 * What change(s) need to be made to the article? Speciate (talk) 17:54, 14 June 2011 (UTC)


 * Whoever wrote this is confused with EHEC, Enterohemorrhagic E. coli. Enteroagglutination E. Coli (EAEC) is designated as such by its ability to adhere to itself and the epithelial cells of the intestine.  It is a problem in developing countries, and is associated with travelers' diarrhea.  Those that have subclinical manifestations may be subject to chronic inflammation and malnutrition as well as associated developmental delay, but not the HUS that was being debated. -MD  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.111.181.100 (talk) 03:51, 25 April 2013 (UTC)

Other outbreaks
I thought I'd found a ref denying the statement presently in the article that there's only been one prior case. But I was wrong - the ref is a different subtype: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Outbreak of acute gastroenteritis attributable to Escherichia coli serotype O104:H21--Helena, Montana, 1994. MMWR Morb Mortal Wkly Rep. 1995;44(27):501-3.

Also, from :
 * While the confirmation methods of O157 STEC infection are well established, this is not always the case for infections caused by STEC non-O157 serotypes. Therefore, underreporting of non-O157 STEC infections is very likely, and their importance for clinical disease in humans is insufficiently understood.
 * [...]
 * STEC infections in humans are under epidemiological surveillance in the EU and in 2009 there were 3 573 reported cases of which about half were caused by the STEC O157:H7 serotype.
 * Since 2008, eight cases of STEC O104 have been reported in the EU, by Austria (one case in 2010), Belgium (two cases in 2008), Denmark (one case in 2008), Norway (three cases in 2009), and Sweden (one case in 2010); three of these cases were imported. In addition, between 2004 and 2009, Austria and Germany reported some positive findings of STEC O104 in food or animals. However, the suggested outbreak strain of serotype STEC 0104:H4 has been rarely reported worldwide.

Again, it seems the subtype is either not established or different from the current outbreak. Perhaps this means this subtype is too exotic to deserve a wikipedia article of its own; maybe we should rename to Escherichia coli O104?--Nø (talk) 18:01, 30 May 2011 (UTC)

When you look into the following table for HUS reference strains :
 * you will see, that round about 1/3 of the strains are EHEC-hlyA-(EHEC hemolysin)-negative. Nevertheless they are subsumed under the same syndrom HUS and the strains have the same shortening HUSEC....

If these hemolysin-negative strains are really not doing a lysis of the erythrocytes' cell membrane, it would be better to call the syndrom "nHUS", and to re-group these trains in a) "nHUSECnumber" and all the others in b) "HUSECnumber". Hans-Hermann Spiess (talk) 12:55, 31 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Please see WP:OR. I suggest publishing a note in some online journal. Speciate (talk) 18:12, 1 June 2011 (UTC)

2011 E. coli O104:H4 outbreak
Any one fancy helping out at 2011 E. coli O104:H4 outbreak?Wipsenade (talk) 09:49, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

Confusion between "outbreak break" and serotype
I think there is some confusion in this article about the "outbreak strain" of O104:H4 and the more general O104:H4 serotype. At the moment, the article seems to suggest that the entire serotype contains shigatoxins. My understanding is that shigatoxins are specific to the German outbreak strain. Anyone out there with a better understanding of bacteriological parthenogenesis than myself want to try and clarify this? NickCT (talk) 12:55, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

E. coli should not have a capital c. Also it should be in italics but I did not fix all of those errors
as the subject suggests, E. coli should be in italics and not have a capital c. I fixed some but not all of these errors — Preceding unsigned comment added by 137.186.157.221 (talk) 01:57, 20 January 2012 (UTC)

Tone
The conversational tone used in the new sections is better suited to the Simple English Wikipedia. Speciate (talk) 01:58, 10 February 2012 (UTC)

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