Tick-Borne Relapsing Fever Outbreak Among a High School Football Team at an Outdoor Education Camping Trip, Arizona, 2014.

During August 2014, five high school students who had attended an outdoor education camp were hospitalized with a febrile illness, prompting further investigation. Ten total cases of tick-borne relapsing fever (TBRF) were identified-six cases confirmed by culture or visualization of spirochetes on blood smear and four probable cases with compatible symptoms (attack rate: 23%). All patients had slept in the campsite's only cabin. Before the camp, a professional pest control company had rodent proofed the cabin, but no acaricides had been applied. Cabin inspection after the camp found rodents and Ornithodoros ticks, the vector of TBRF. Blood samples from a chipmunk trapped near the cabin and from patients contained Borrelia hermsii with identical gene sequences (100% over 630 base pairs). Health departments in TBRF endemic areas should consider educating cabin owners and pest control companies to apply acaricides during or following rodent proofing, because ticks that lack rodents for a blood meal might feed on humans.

Hydrogen peroxide vapor room disinfection and hand hygiene improvements reduce Clostridium difficile infection, methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus, vancomycin-resistant enterococci, and extended-spectrum ß-lactamase.

We report a statistically significant reduction in Clostridium difficile infection (from 1.38 to 0.90 cases per 1,000 patient days), vancomycin-resistant enterococci (from 0.21 to 0.01 cases per 1,000 patient days), and extended-spectrum ß-lactamase-producing gram-negative bacteria (from 0.16 to 0.01 cases per 1,000 patient days) associated with the introduction of hydrogen peroxide vapor for terminal decontamination of patient rooms and improvements in hand hygiene compliance.

Nosocomial transmission of invasive group a streptococcus from patient to health care worker.

BACKGROUND: Nosocomial transmission of group A streptococcus (GAS) has been well described. Instances resulting in fulminant disease among health care workers have not been described. Contact and droplet precautions have been advised to minimize the risk of nosocomial transmission. We aimed to determine whether a case of invasive GAS pneumonia and streptococcal toxic shock syndrome in a respiratory therapist was acquired as a result of caring for a patient with GAS necrotizing fasciitis. Contacts of these patients were screened to determine if they were the reservoir of the GAS. Genetic testing to confirm clonal transmission was conducted. METHODS: Contacts of the patients with GAS infection were screened using questionnaires and testing of pharyngeal specimens. Specimens from patients and carriers of GAS who were identified during screening were subjected to pulsed-field gel electrophoresis and emm gene typing. RESULTS: We identified 705 contacts of the 2 patients; all contacts had oropharyngeal specimens collected for culture. Only the index patient and the respiratory therapist yielded identical pulse-field gel electrophoresis GAS isolates, with clonality indicated by emm typing. CONCLUSIONS: Nosocomial transmission of GAS from a patient to a health care worker who developed streptococcal toxic shock syndrome may have occurred after the index patient had received 48 h of antibiotic therapy and despite placement in contact isolation. Isolation guidelines for patients with severe GAS infection may need to be reviewed.