Rotavirus infection is an acute infectious disease mainly affecting children. The main symptoms are fever, vomiting and diarrhoea and many affected children suffer from extensive fluid loss in need of medical attention. The incubation period is 1-2 days.
This report presents the results of an external quality assessment carried out in 2014 to test laboratories’ ability to correctly identify strains of Haemophilus influenzae.
This report describes the occurrence of invasive bacterial diseases (IBD) in Europe during 2012, based on data collected through The European Surveillance System (TESSy).
This report presents the epidemiological situation for vaccine-preventable diseases – invasive bacterial diseases (invasive Haemophilus influenzae, meningococcal and pneumococcal disease) as of 2012 and describes the statistical and epidemiological methods used.
This report describes the epidemiology of invasive bacterial disease due to Haemophilus influenzae and Neisseria meningitidis in EU and EEA Member States in 2010.
In May 2012 a collection of five strains of Haemophilus spp was sent to 28 participating reference laboratories in the IBD-labnet surveillance network for quality assurance testing. The laboratories were asked to characterise the five strains by performing standard laboratory protocols for the methods usually used by the laboratory for: species identification, biotyping and serotyping by serological methods and/or PCR.
The results of this EQA are published in the this report.
In Europe, routine rotavirus vaccination of infants at the national level has been introduced with one or two vaccine brands in Finland, Austria, Luxembourg and Belgium within well-baby clinics or administered by general practitioners and paediatricians. When introducing a new vaccine, it is crucial to conduct studies evaluating the vaccination’s impact and effectiveness in order to decide on recommendations for its future use.
When introducing a new vaccine, it is crucial to conduct studies evaluating the vaccination’s impact and effectiveness in order to decide on recommendations for its future use. To this end, ECDC has produced three generic protocols.
The results of this external quality assurance distribution have shown that European Haemophilus reference laboratories differ in the level of characterisation of strains, ranging from simple speciation to full identification and typing. All but two laboratories routinely phenotypically serotype isolates. Fifteen laboratories (52%) performed PCR-based capsular genotyping, 23 laboratories (79%) reported antimicrobial susceptibility testing results.