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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.

​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.

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 occurrence of invasive bacterial diseases (IBD) in Europe during 2012, based on data collected through The European Surveillance System (TESSy).