Faster Method to Identify Salmonella Strains

submitted by Luis Kun

homelandsecuritynewswire.com - June 4, 2013

There are more than a million estimated cases of salmonellosis annually in the United States, resulting in approximately 400 deaths, nearly 20,000 hospitalizations and an economic burden of millions of dollars. New method may significantly reduce the time it takes health officials to identify Salmonella strains.

A new approach may be able to reduce by more than half the time it takes health officials to identify Salmonella strains, according to researchers in Penn State’s College of Agricultural Sciences.

The finding may significantly speed up the response to many outbreaks of foodborne illness, allowing epidemiological investigators to identify the exact strains of Salmonella that make people sick and to find more quickly — and eliminate — the source of the disease.

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