Prevalence of Enteropathogenic, Enteroaggregative., and Diffusely Adherent Escherichia coli among Isolates from Children with Diarrhea in New Caledonia
The clinical significance of HEp-2–adherent Escherichia coli in children with diarrhea in New Caledonia has been examined by testing isolates from stools of ill children and matched controls in a HEp-2 cell binding assay and by hybridizing the same clones with DNA probes identifying the enteropathogenic (EPEC), enteroaggregative (EAggEC), and diffusely adherent (DAEC) E. coli. From the 100 patient-control pairs, 35 HEp-2–adherent strains were isolated; 24 were identified as the only pathogen in stools of ill children, and 11were from controls. EPEC strains were significantly associated with diarrheal disease (P < .008) in children in the first 2 years of life. For the DAEC strains, the difference in rate of isolation between patients and controls was significant only when the presence of afaldaa sequences in the strains was considered (P = .03, Fisher's exact test). The afaldaa-positive DAEC isolates were characterized from children 2–6 years old. EAggEC strains were isolated equally in patients and controls.