Dairy Products, Produce and Other Non-Meat Foods as Possible Sources of Campylobacter jejuni and Campylobacter coli Enteritis

Abstract

To determine the role of dairy products and produce in the occurence of Campylobacter jejuni and Campylobacter coli (CJC) enteritis, we analyzed dietary histories obtained from 218 persons with Campylobacter enteritis who were diagnosed by culture betwen April, 1982, and September, 1983. For comparison, similar histories were obtained from 526 persons without CJC enteritis. Both ill and well subjects were enrollees of the Group Health Cooperative of Puget Sound (GHC). Raw milk (relative risk (RR) = 4.6) and mushrooms (RR = 1.5) were the only non-meat foods consumed significantly more often by cases than by controls. Cases infected with strains carrying plasmid-mediated tetracyline resistance (R factors) were somewhat more likely (RR = 8.5) than those infected with other strains (RR = 2.5) to have acquired their infections from raw milk (P = 0.03). In this population, approximately 10% of the tetracycline-resistant CJC infections were attributable to raw milk consumption as compared to only 2% of the infections with tetracycline-sensitive strains.