Molecular epidemiology of Mycobacterium tuberculosis clinical isolates in Southwest Ireland.

Tuberculosis has had significant effects on Ireland over the past two centuries, causing persistently higher morbidity and mortality than in neighbouring countries until the last decade. This study describes the results of genotyping and drug susceptibility testing of 171 strains of Mycobacterium tuberculosis complex isolated between January 2004 and December 2006 in a region of Ireland centred on the city of Cork. Spoligotype comparisons were made with the SpolDB4 database and clustered 130 strains in 23 groups, forty-one strains showed unique Spoligotyping patterns.

Mycobacterium bovis strains causing smear-positive human tuberculosis, Southwest Ireland.

Mycobacterium bovis caused 3% of human tuberculosis cases in southwest Ireland during 1998-2006. Of 11 M. bovis strains genotyped, 9 belonged to common animal spoligotypes.

Drug-resistant tuberculosis, clinical virulence, and the dominance of the Beijing strain family in Russia.

Context: Tuberculosis and multidrug-resistant tuberculosis is a serious public health problem in Russia.

Objective: To address the extent of "Beijing strain" transmission in the prison/civil sectors and the association of drug resistance, clinical, and social factors with the Beijing genotype.

Design And Setting: Cross-sectional population-based molecular epidemiological study of all civilian and penitentiary tuberculosis facilities in the Samara region, Russia.