High transmissibility of the modern Beijing Mycobacterium tuberculosis in homeless patients of Japan

Received 29 March 2009; received in revised form 24 May 2009; accepted 24 May 2009. published online 22 June 2009.

Summary

A population-based study of Mycobacterium tuberculosis isolated from homeless tuberculosis patients was performed during 2002–2004 in Osaka City, Japan. The data show that the ancient Beijing subfamily was predominant, whereas clustered isolates based on refined variable number of tandem repeats genotyping (19 loci) mainly belonged to the modern Beijing subfamily, suggesting its increased transmissibility.

Keywords: Mycobacterium tuberculosis, Beijing family, VNTR, Japan, Homeless

a Department of Microbiology, Osaka City Institute of Public Health and Environmental Sciences, 8-34 Tojo-cho, Tennoji-ku, Osaka 543-0026, Japan

b Department of Infectious Disease, Health Center of Osaka City, 1-2-7-1000 Asahi-machi, Abeno-ku, Osaka 545-0051, Japan

c Department of Bacteriology, Osaka City University Graduate School of Medicine, 1-4-3 Asahi-machi, Abeno-ku, Osaka 545-8585, Japan

d Department of Virology, Osaka City University Graduate School of Medicine, 1-4-3 Asahi-machi, Abeno-ku, Osaka 545-8585, Japan

Corresponding author. Tel.: +81 6 6771 3148; fax: +81 6 6772 0676.

PII: S1472-9792(09)00050-X

doi:10.1016/j.tube.2009.05.007

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