Trends in indigenous foodborne disease and deaths, England and Wales: 1992 to 2000

Abstract

Background: Commitment to food safety is evidenced by high profile governmental initiatives around the globe. To measure progress towards targets, policy makers need to know the baseline from which they started. Aim: To describe the burden (mortality, morbidity, new presentations to general practice, hospital admissions, and hospital occupancy) and trends of indigenous foodborne disease (IFD) in England and Wales between 1992 and 2000. Methods: Routinely available surveillance data, special survey data, and hospital episode statistics were collated and arithmetic employed to estimate the burden and trends of IFD in England and Wales. Adjustments were made for underascertainment of disease through national surveillance and for foreign travel. The final estimates were compared with those from the USA. Results: In 1995 there were an estimated 2 365 909 cases, 21 138 hospital admissions, and 718 deaths in England and Wales due to IFD. By 2000 this had fallen to 1 338 772 cases, 20 759 hospital admissions, and 480 deaths. In terms of disease burden the most important pathogens were campylobacters, salmonellas, Clostridium perfringens, verocytotoxin producing Escherichia coli (VTEC) O157, and Listeria monocytogenes. The ratio of food related illness in the USA to IFD in England and Wales in 2000 was 57:1. Taking into account population rates, this ratio fell to 11:1 and converged when aetiology and disease severity were considered. Conclusion: Reducing IFD in England and Wales means tackling campylobacter. Lowering mortality rates however also requires better control and prevention of salmonellas, Cl perfringens, L monocytogenes, and VTEC O157.

Community incidence of pathogen-specific gastroenteritis: reconstructing the surveillance pyramid for seven pathogens in seven European Union member states

“…Reconstructing the surveillance pyramid provides important information for interpretation of reported data, and provision of incidence estimates that can be meaningfully compared. Such studies are attractive as they are relatively easy to perform in comparison to population-based surveys such as the IID studies in the UK [4,5] and the Sensor study in The Netherlands [6]. Our results confirm that the degree of underreporting varies widely by pathogen and by country.…”

“…In England and Wales, the IID1 study estimated that in 1993-1996 there were 3 . 2 cases of salmonellosis in the population for every case reported to national surveillance [4]. The recently published IID2 study indicated that in [2008][2009], this multiplier had increased to 4 .…”

The effect of temperature on food poisoning: a time-series analysis of salmonellosis in ten European countries

“…For example, Salmonella infection causes more deaths annually than any other foodborne pathogen in England and Wales [1]. Within Europe, Salmonella sp.…”

Abbreviations and acronyms

“…like outbreak-based attribution efforts by cSPI (2009), cDc (Painter et al 2009) and public health agencies in the United kingdom (Adak et al 2002), our approach involves three steps. First, outbreak data is aggregated over some a defined time period.…”

“…The most comprehensive primary data source available in the U.S. that can be used for food attribution of foodborne illness is cDc's outbreak surveillance data. numerous categorization schemes have been used to analyze outbreak data for food attribution patterns, including those developed by the Uk Health Protection Agency centre for Infections (HPA) (Adak et al 2002), by cDc (Painter et al 2009), and by the center for Science in the Public Interest (cSPI) (2009).…”