Exploring the "Latin American Mediterranean" family and the RD lineage in Mycobacterium tuberculosis isolates from Paraguay, Argentina and Venezuela.

Background: The Latin American & Mediterranean (LAM) spoligotype family is one of the most successful genotype of Mycobacterium tuberculosis worldwide and particularly prevalent in South-America. Within this family, a sublineage named Region of Difference Rio (RD) was reported initially in Brazil and is characterized by a genomic deletion of about 26.3 kb.

First insight into Mycobacterium tuberculosis genetic diversity in Paraguay.

Background: We present a picture of the biodiversity of Mycobacterium tuberculosis in Paraguay, an inland South American country harboring 5 million inhabitants with a tuberculosis notification rate of 38/100,000.

Results: A total of 220 strains collected throughout the country in 2003 were classified by spoligotyping into 79 different patterns. Spoligopatterns of 173 strains matched 51 shared international types (SITs) already present in an updated version of SpolDB4, the global spoligotype database at Pasteur Institute, Guadeloupe.