Page 49 - FoodFocusThailand No.176 November 2020

STRONG QC & QA

breeders, abattoir workers, butchers, and direct contact with patients and patients’ objects or feces.
veterinarians. (3) Infection through a Therefore, frequent handwashing plays a vital role to prevent
conjunctiva. spreading of NoV.
S. suis is an etiologic agent of a severe NoV can cause gastroenteritis in humans in all age group
systematic S. suis infection in human. It with the risk populations that may develop more severe
causes S. suis meningitis with various symptoms including hospitalized patients, elderly people,
features including headache, fever, vomiting, immunocompromised individual, young children, and infants.
body ache, joint pain, neck stiffness, and The common symptoms are explosive and projectile vomiting,
confusion. Persons may develop septicemia nausea, abdominal cramps, and watery, non-bloody diarrhea.
and other complications such as acute renal Some people might experience headache, mild fever, chill,
failure, infective endocarditis, and severe and muscle aches. The duration of illness is approximately
sepsis. Petechiae, purpura, ecchymoses, and 12-60 hours, while most people recover by 1-2 days. Death rate owing to norovirus infection
shock were also reported. Additionally, one is relatively low. It was reported that the infective dose of NoV is as low as 1-10 viral particles
important feature of S. suis infection in human
is that the majority of infected persons loss
hearing ability, and this symptom could
become permanent leading to deaf. Hearing
and balance impairments might be existed
after recovery. Illnesses caused by S. suis
infection can be fatal.
Preventive measures for S. suis infection
are as follows. (1) Persons who handle pigs
or involved in butchering pork should wear
gloves, boots, and proper clothes during an
operation. (2) Thoroughly cook pork, internal
organs, and pig blood before consumption.
(3) Avoid consuming pork from infected pigs
or pigs that died from diseases and always
purchase pork from reliable sources
(4) Always wash hand before and touching
raw pork, internal organs and purchase pork
that is stored under low temperature. (5) Do
not expose an open wound to pigs or raw
pork.

Noroviruses (NoV)
Currently, NoV are major causative agents of
gastroenteritis worldwide. There are reported
cases of acute gastroenteritis in all age groups
in Thailand. It is notable that the incidence of
norovirus-associated outbreaks typically took
place where a lot of people gather such as
schools, dormitories, day-care centers,
nursing homes, hotels, recreation camps, and
cruise ships or after natural disaster such as
earthquake and hurricane. It is important to
note that NoV are extremely stable in the
environment and able to withstand a variety
of environmental stresses including high
temperature, acidity, chilling, drought, and
chlorine in tap water causing difficulties to
destroy NoV that contaminated foods and
water. The common food vehicles of
transmission are ready-to-eat foods, salad,
vegetables, fruits, meat that are prepared by
infected food handlers, and raw oysters
harvested from contaminated water sources.
Additional routes of transmission include
aerosolized vomitus particles from infected
person, person-to-person spread through
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