Impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on infection in a tertiary healthcare institution in Belgium.

Objectives: Clostridioides difficile infection (CDI) causes the greatest number of healthcare-associated infectious diarrhoea. CDIs are transmitted by direct and indirect patient-to-patient contact and risk increases with the use of antibiotics. Since early 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic has affected healthcare systems in many ways including substantial changes in hygiene behaviour.

Corrigendum to " beyond stools: dog nasal discharge as a possible new vector of bacterial transmission" [Heliyon 5 (5) (May 2019) e01629].

[This corrects the article DOI: 10.1016/j.heliyon.

Seasonality of Clostridium difficile in the natural environment.

Clostridium difficile is considered the leading cause of antibiotic-associated disease worldwide. In the past decade, a large number of studies have focused on identifying the main sources of contamination in order to elucidate the complete life cycle of the infection. Hospitals, animals and retail foods have been considered as potential vectors.

beyond stools: dog nasal discharge as a possible new vector of bacterial transmission.

Zoonotic transmission of has been largely hypothesised to occur after direct or indirect contact with contaminated animal faeces. Recent studies have reported the presence of the bacterium in the natural environment, including in soils and rivers. If spores are scattered in the environment, they can easily enter the respiratory tract of dogs, and therefore, dog nasal discharge could be a direct route of transmission not previously investigated.

Outbreak of multidrug-resistant tuberculosis in South Africa undetected by WHO-endorsed commercial tests: an observational study.

Background: Global roll-out of rapid molecular assays is revolutionising the diagnosis of rifampicin resistance, predictive of multidrug-resistance, in tuberculosis. However, 30% of the multidrug-resistant (MDR) strains in an eSwatini study harboured the Ile491Phe mutation in the rpoB gene, which is associated with poor rifampicin-based treatment outcomes but is missed by commercial molecular assays or scored as susceptible by phenotypic drug-susceptibility testing deployed in South Africa. We evaluated the presence of Ile491Phe among South African tuberculosis isolates reported as isoniazid-monoresistant according to current national testing algorithms.