A health network to enhance the surveillance of foodborne diseases in Australia
News
The OzFoodNet website has now moved - please change your bookmarks to www.ozfoodnet.gov.au
OzFoodNet, in conjunction with State and Territory health departments and laboratories investigated five multi-jurisdictional outbreaks of foodborne disease in 2009. These outbreaks included listeriosis associated with chicken wraps, Salmonella Litchfield following a car trek and hepatitis A associated with semi-dried tomatoes. To assist with the process of investigating multi-jurisdictional outbreaks, OzFoodNet has prepared draft national guidelines and will host an advanced investigation workshop in Adelaide in June 2010.
During 2009, OzFoodNet completed data collection for the National Gastroenteritis Survey II. The survey was a year-long nationwide cross-sectional survey that asked participants whether they had experienced gastroenteritis in the previous month. This survey was a repeat of one conducted in 2001–2, which found that Australians experienced approximately 17.2 million episodes of gastroenteritis every year.
OzFoodNet is part of a World Health Organization capacity building network—Global Foodborne Infections Network (GFN) that was formerly known as Global SalmSurv (http://www.who.int/gfn/en) . GFN supports laboratory-based surveillance of foodborne diseases, by teaching epidemiologists and laboratory scientists to conduct surveillance for foodborne infections and investigate outbreaks. In 2009, OzFoodNet sent a trainer to an advanced foodborne disease surveillance course in Thailand and hosted the GFN annual steering committee meeting in Canberra.
Information on outbreaks resulting from contaminated food can be accessed through the OzFoodNet Outbreak Register. Currently, the Register has data on the major causes of foodborne disease outbreaks for 2001 to December 2008. Data can be extracted by implicated food, setting where the food was prepared, and causative agent. OzFoodNet Outbreak Register
Recent publications
Dalton CB, Merritt TD, Unicomb LE, Kirk MD, Stafford RJ, Lalor K; the OzFoodNet Working Group. A national case-control study of risk factors for listeriosis in Australia. Epidemiology and Infection 2010; 1-9.Hall G, McDonald L, Majowicz SE, Scallan E, Kirk M, Sockett P and Angulo FJ. Respiratory symptoms and the case definition of gastroenteritis: an international analysis of the potential impact on burden estimates. Epidemiology and Infection 2010; 138(1): 117-124.
Kirk MD, Veitch MG and Hall GV. Gastroenteritis and food-borne disease in elderly people living in long-term care. Clinical Infectious Diseases 2010; 50(3): 397-404.
Majowicz SE, Musto J, Scallan E, Angulo FJ, Kirk M, O'Brien SJ, Jones TF, Fazil A and Hoekstra RM; The global burden of nontyphoidal Salmonella gastroenteritis. Clinical Infectious Diseases 2010; 50(6): 882-9.
Moffatt CR, Cameron S, Mickan L and Givney RC. Campylobacter jejuni Gastroenteritis at an Australian Boarding School: Consistency between Epidemiology, flaA Typing, and Multilocus Sequence Typing. Foodborne Pathogens and Disease 2010; July 9 (Epub ahead of print).
Moffatt CR, Lafferty AR, Khan S, Krsteski R, Valcanis M, Powling J and Veitch M. Salmonella Rubislaw gastroenteritis linked to a pet lizard. The Medical Journal of Australia 2010; 193(1): 54-5.
Health Department sites participating in OzFoodNet
Australian Capital Territory | New South Wales | Northern Territory | Queensland | South Australia | Tasmania | Victoria | Western Australia
To obtain alternative copies of any of the above documents please email OzFoodNet@health.gov.au
Page currency, Latest update: 25 August, 2010