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In developed countries, the pasteurization of milk and the culling of infected cattle have nearly eliminated human cases of Mycobacterium bovis TB. After two epidemiologically linked human cases of M. bovis infection were identified in the Midlands (U.K.), investigators performed DNA fingerprinting on isolates from all 20 human cases of the disease in that region from 2001 through 2005. Additional information was obtained using a standardized questionnaire.
Isolates from six patients were indistinguishable by two different molecular typing methods. Clinical presentation suggested progressive primary infection; five patients had pulmonary disease, and one had meningitis. Five were male, and the mean age was 31.7 years. (Most M. bovis–infected…