BackgroundAlthough Morbillivirus and Toxoplasma gondii have emerged as important pathogens for several cetaceans populations over the last 20 years, they have never been identified together in a Mysticete. In particular, morbilliviral infection has been never described in the Mediterranean fin whale population.Case presentationOn January 2011 an adult male of fin whale (Balaenoptera physalus) stranded along the Tyrrhenian coastline of Italy. During necropsy, tissue samples from heart, skeletal muscle, mesenteric lymph nodes, liver, spleen, lung, and kidney were collected and subsequently analyzed for Morbillivirus and Toxoplasma gondii by microscopic and molecular methods. Following the detailed necropsy carried out on this whale, molecular analysis revealed, for the first time, the simultaneous presence of a Dolphin Morbillivirus (DMV) and T. gondii infection coexisting with each other, along with high organochlorine pollutant concentrations, with special reference to DDT.ConclusionThis report, besides confirming the possibility for Mysticetes to be infected with DMV, highlights the risk of toxoplasmosis in sea water for mammals, already immunodepressed by concurrent factors as infections and environmental contaminants.

Meat products from HEV-infected reservoir animal species are capable of transmitting HEV to humans and represent a public health concern. Human HEV cases have been linked to the consumption of raw or undercooked pig liver sausages, pork, and game meats, such as wild boars and deer worldwide. Direct exposure to swine or wild game species might also represent a source of HEV transmission especially for veterinarians, hunters, or butchers. A limited amount of data is available on HEV prevalence in wild boars in Italy and no data are available for other wild game species intended for human consumption. In this study, the circulation of HEV in four different animal species hunted in north-western Italy was evaluated to gain insight into the infection levels and the genetic diversity of the virus in such animal populations. Liver samples of 372 wild boars, 30 roe deer, 47 European hares and 38 coypus were analyzed for HEV RNA by real-time RT-PCR; positive samples were then sequenced and submitted to phylogenetic analysis. HEV RNA was detected in the livers of 7/372 (1.9%) wild boars tested, while no sample was positive for roe deer, European hare, and coypu. Phylogenetic analysis showed that wild boar HEV sequences belonged to HEV subtypes 3e, 3c, and 3f. Our results indicate that HEV is circulating only in wild boar among the considered game species in north-western Italy and suggest a potential zoonotic risk related to handling and/or consumption of raw or undercooked meat and products made of the liver from this species.

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We investigated the virulence properties of four Vibrio parahaemolyticus strains causing acute gastroenteritis following consumption of indigenous mussels in Italy. The isolated strains were cytotoxic and adhesive but, surprisingly, lacked tdh, trh, and type three secretion system 2 (T3SS2) genes. We emphasize that nontoxigenic V. parahaemolyticus can induce acute gastroenteritis, highlighting the need for more investigation of the pathogenicity of this microorganism. Vibrio parahaemolyticus infections cause acute, self-limiting gastroenteritis, typically characterized by diarrhea, abdominal cramps, nausea, vomiting, fever, and chills, lasting 1 to 3 days. The onset usually occurs within 24 h of eating contaminated food. Cases are most commonly reported during the warmer months and are often associated with eating raw or undercooked shellfish or other cooked foods that have been cross-contaminated with raw shellfish (22). Pathogenicity of this microorganism is attributed to the production of a thermostable direct hemolysin (TDH) and the TDH-related hemolysin (TRH) (13). Recently, type three secretion system 2 (T3SS2) of V. parahaemolyticus has been investigated as an additional potential indicator of strain virulence (2,8,17). Together, the tdh, trh, and T3SS2 genes are widely considered the predominant indicators of strain virulence for this microorganism (8). This is substantiated by the prevalence of these genetic markers in clinical V. parahaemolyticus isolates, as opposed to their infrequent detection in food and environmental samples (8).For this report, we characterized four V. parahaemolyticus strains lacking tdh, trh, and T3SS2 genes isolated as the sole pathogen from patients affected by acute gastroenteritis with indigenous mussels as the most probable source of infection. On 20 September 2010 in Torino (northern Italy), 4 people were hospitalized with acute gastroenteritis. The first case involved a healthy 47-year-old man (patient A), while a family group outbreak involved another three healthy individuals: a 55-year-old woman (patient B), a 59-year-old man (patient C), and a 58-year-old man (patient D). Epidemiological information reported that none of the patients had recently traveled to other countries and that on 19 September they had eaten home-cooked mussels, probably undercooked. Mussels involved in both the sporadic case and the outbreak came from the same Italian growing area (North Adriatic), but it was not possible to trace the specific lots. Patient A and patients B, C, and D developed diarrhea, fever, abdominal cramps, nausea, and vomiting about 13 h and about 18 h after mussel consumption, respectively. On admission, the patients were treated with intravenous hydration, and the symptoms ceased within 48 h without the need for antibiotic therapy.Stool specimens of patients were cultured on MacConkey agar, Salmonella-Shigella agar, Columbia blood agar, Hektoen agar, 5% sheep blood agar supplemented with ampicillin (30 g/ml) (ASBA 30), Yersinia cefsulodin-irgasan-novobiocin (CIN) agar (a...

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