Published September 28, 2022
Monitoring of an aquatic pathogen’s genetic lineage cannot predict severe disease
Vibrio vulnificus (V. vulnificus) is an aquatic bacterium capable of causing severe disease in humans. It can infect people via food or water contamination and lead to severe gastroenteritis, life-threatening wound infections and even septic shock, especially in those who are immunocompromised. Foodborne infections typically occur after someone eats raw or undercooked seafood, particularly oysters, and wound infections occur after seawater or seafood penetrates injured skin or open wounds.
Previous studies have suggested that certain genetic strains of V. vulnificus that secrete a specific toxin are more virulent and could be associated with more severe patient outcomes.
But a research team led by Sonya Trinh, MD, MPH, Associate Program Director of the Ochsner Infectious Diseases Fellowship and the Medical Director of Hematopoietic Cell Transplantation and Cellular Therapy Infectious Diseases at Ochsner Health, and including two other Ochsner researchers – George Pankey, MD, Director of Infectious Diseases Research, and Deborah Ashcraft, Supervisor of the Infectious Disease Translational Research Laboratory – found that among 109 clinical isolates collected between 2011 and 2019, severe disease outcomes did not correlate with a specific genetic lineage. Severe infections were defined as those requiring hospitalization for more than two weeks, amputation and/or death.
Their findings, published in mBio, showed that both major lineages were capable of causing severe disease and even death. From a public health surveillance perspective, the team’s data suggest that polymerase chain reaction (PCR) and sequence-based monitoring to distinguish lineages in the environment or in seafood are not sufficient to prevent the incidence of these rare but serious infections.
