First report of a norovirus outbreak associated with the variant Sydney 2012 in Portugal.

INTRODUCTION

This study describes the investigation of a gastroenteritis outbreak in a group of students, associated with a dinner reunion in February 2013 in Porto, Portugal.

METHODOLOGY

An anonymous structured questionnaire was developed and sent to 34 students who attended the dinner reunion. Eighteen students completed the questionnaire and thirteen met the case definition (attack rate of 72%). Stools from two students were screened for norovirus by RT-PCR using primer pairs that target the highly conserved polymerase gene and the capsid gene.

RESULTS

Norovirus genotyping confirmed the variant Sydney 2012 as the probable cause of the outbreak.

CONCLUSION

This is the first report of an outbreak associated with the new variant Sydney 2012 in Portugal.