They picked up 19 more cases and added a state to the multistate outbreak of Salmonella linked to live poultry from backyard flocks, but the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is essentially calling it over. The outbreak traced to the source of the chicks — Ohio’s Mt. Healthy Hatcheries — appears to have ended, according to CDC. But it did not end before causing 363 illnesses in 43 states and Puerto Rico. The outbreak strains involved were Salmonella Infantis, Salmonella Newport and Salmonella Hadar. About one-third of those sickened required hospitalization, but nobody died. The infections came from contact with chicks, ducklings, and other poultry from the Ohio hatchery. CDC reports that 73 percent of those who became ill were in contact with live poultry in the immediate week beforehand. This is the third year in a row that Mt. Healthy Hatcheries has been associated with a Salmonella outbreak. CDC’s National Antimicrobial Resistance Monitoring System (NARMS) laboratory conducted antibiotic resistance testing on Salmonella isolates collected from 11 ill persons infected with the outbreak strains of Salmonella Infantis or Salmonella Newport. Of the 11 isolates tested:

  • Two (18 percent) were resistant to tetracycline.
  • Nine (82 percent) were susceptible to all antibiotics on the NARMS panel.

The total number of ill persons identified in each state was as follows: Alabama (9),  Arizona (3), Arkansas (3), California (5), Colorado (5), Connecticut (2), Florida (1), Georgia (17), Idaho (5), Illinois (6), Iowa (5), Indiana (4), Kansas (2), Kentucky (15), Louisiana (1), Maine (9), Maryland (3), Massachusetts (2), Michigan (2), Minnesota (3), Mississippi (2), Missouri (2), Montana (3),  Nebraska (5), New Hampshire (3), New Jersey (3), New Mexico (2), New York (36), North Carolina (34), Ohio (31),  Oregon (2), Pennsylvania (33), Puerto Rico (1), South Carolina (9), South Dakota (6), Tennessee (20), Texas (4), Utah (2), Vermont (7), Virginia (25), Washington (10), West Virginia (18), Wisconsin (2), and Wyoming (1).