Discover a possible source for cholera Yemen

A study conducted jointly by the British Wellcome Sanger Institute and the French Pastor revealed that a strain from East Africa, introduced with the migration of people to and from the region, is the most likely source of the cholera outbreak in Yemen.

In a study published Jan. 2 in the journal Nature, researchers found that a strain of bacteria causing the cholera outbreak in Yemen was associated with the 7PET strain, which appeared for the first time. first time in 2012 in South Asia and spread in East Africa between 2013 and 2014, before reappearing in Yemen in 2016.

Yemen has been affected by two cholera outbreaks, the first from September 2016 to April 2017 and the second in April 2017, resulting in more than one million suspected cases, which resulted in the death of approximately 2,500 people. people. The researchers invited to study this case, the worst cholera epidemic in the recorded history of the disease.

"We have studied bacterial isolates from National Public Health Laboratories in Sanaa and 3 isolates from a Saudi hospital located near the border with Yemen," said Dr. Francois Xavier Weil, head of the health unit. Pasteurist gastroenterology unit of the Institut Pasteur and principal investigator. , Was sent by the Ministry of Health of Saudi Arabia.

The total isolates were 42 samples from Yemen and 74 samples from South Asia, the Middle East and East and Central Africa, compared to a global group of more than 1,000 cholera samples from of the 1960s pandemic, caused by a single cholera. "V. cholerae 7PET".

With the help of genomic sequencing, the researchers found that an abnormal bacterial strain causing the Yemeni cholera outbreak was associated with 7PET.

This finding contradicts previous theories that the cholera outbreak in Yemen was caused by two different strains: while most of the cholera strains that cause epidemics are resistant to many antibiotics, the Unusual result of the study was also the disappearance of the Yemeni cholera strain. Including 4 genes responsible for antibiotic resistance, found in other breeds, which makes them susceptible to treatment.

And why the source of the infection came from East Africa and not from South Asia where the strain first appeared; "It is known that the transmission of cholera from one place to another is by infected human groups, not because the disease reappears several years after its last appearance, and that new sequential DNA technologies have allowed us to to monitor the spread of cholera worldwide, which would help public and national health authorities to take appropriate control measures and take preventive measures. "