Cronobacter spp. have been implicated as the causative agents in various life threatening diseases such as necrotising enterocolitis (NEC), meningitis, septicaemia, and pneumonia, affecting a wide range of age groups (Caubilla-Barron et al. 2007, Muytjens et al. 1983).
Cronobacter spp. cases have been detected and reported among infants and even among the infant population, the high risk group has been pre-term, low birth weight infants, <2500 g and not more than 28 days old (Lai et al. 2007). The symptoms that have been observed among infants, suffering from Cronobacter infections include abscess, bacteraemia or sepsis, conjunctivitis, digestive problems, necrotising enterocolitis, meningitis, and tonsillitis. Among these, the meningitis cases have been reported to be the most frequent, followed by bacteraemia and necrotising enterocolitis (Healy et al. 2009). Based on a survey conducted by the Foodborne Diseases Active…show more content… It has been frequently found to affect elderly or immunocompromised adults, especially those have been isolated in bacteraemia cases as well as sepsis, pneumonia, and wound infections. The majority of these adults were reported to be older than 50 years (Lai 2001). However, these adult cases are generally not as severe as the ones in the younger age group. Also, because of the higher sensitivity associated to the neonatal age group, the cases among adults and older children do not seem to be reported or documented as often. Among adults, greater incidences of only colonization have been reported rather than those related to infection. Some adult Cronobacter infections have also arisen as secondary infections, due to other underlying problems such as malignancies. To date, meningitis cases caused by Cronobacter spp. have not been reported in any adults (Friedemann