Epidemic Diarrhea in a School for Boys

Outbreak of Nonbacterial Gastroenteritis at a Boy Scout Ranch

“…The frequency of illness was undoubtedly related to the duration of exposure and the duration of observation. The incidence of gastroenteritis among campers staying 2 weeks and the perma¬ nent staff was more than three times higher than it was among campers staying 1 week. The attack rates in the former groups corresponded well to those reported in other outbreaks (6J2) in which the period of observation was longer than 1 week.…”

“…The weekly incidence of gastroenteritis ob¬ served among campers staying only 1 week be¬ tween July 31 and August 27,1957, is shown in table 2. The attack rates ranged from 9 to 16 with an average of 12 per 100 persons.…”

“…sporadically or in epidemics. Most of the knowledge regarding this disease has been de¬ rived from studying outbreaks occurring in institutional populations (1)(2)(3)(4)(5)(6).…”

Winter vomiting disease in Florida students

“…The outbreaks have nearly always taken place between September and March. Numerous reports (Zahorsky, 1929;Ailler & Raven, 1936;Gray, 1939;Bradley, 1943;Reimann et al 1945a;Gordon et al 1947;Hargreaves, 1947;Kuhns & Wetherbee, 1950;Ingalls & Britten, 1951;Webster, 1953;Simpson, 1954;Haworth et al 1956, Pollock & Clayton, 1964Cumming & McEvedy, 1969) in the British and American literature over the past three decades have described epidemics of Winter Vomiting Disease (synonyms are epidemic vomiting, epidemic gastroenteritis, epidemic nausea and vomiting, and epidemic diarrhoea and vomiting), and the subject has been reviewed in recent years (Editorial, 1969;Webb & Wallace, 1966 (Cheever, 1967) have been associated with viral dysentery, the term Reimann (1963) uses to include Winter Vomiting Disease and its synonyms, but attempts to isolate and identify a virus in several large-scale autumn and winter school and institutional outbreaks have been unsuccessful (Webster, 1953;Haworth et al 1956;Pollock & Clayton, 1964).…”

“…Hargreaves (1947), discussing an epidemic which occurred in a Cornwall institution, and which affected certain wards but spared others, concluded that the 'infection is airborne'. Ingalls & Britten (1951), describing an epidemic in a school for boys, felt that their data supported dissemination through personal contact. Gordon (1955) agreed that the usual mode of spread was by person to person contact.…”