Meningitis por Streptococcus suis: ¿una zoonosis emergente?

Streptococcus suis is an important pathogen associated with a wide range of diseases in pigs, constituting one of the most important problems of the swine industry around the world.

However, infection with S. suis in humans is very rare and is considered an unusual zoonosis because from 1968 until 2004 had described only around 250 cases around the world.

The emergence of some very large outbreaks of infection with S. suis in Europe and Southeast Asia from the year 2005, and the increase in the incidence of cases in other European countries, has made to think that we can find about a process of emergence of these infections.

S. suis is a Gram-positive facultative anaerobic coccus, belonging to R, S, and T Lancefield groups. Until recently, there have been major difficulties in the identification and differentiation of this organism of other Streptococcus species, what could be the cause of an underestimation of these infections. It's currently with diagnostic tools and molecular typing that allow a better characterization of the isolates.

The most frequent S. suis in humans infection is meningitis, but endocarditis, pneumonia, cellulitis, rhabdomyolysis, arthritis, spondylodiscitis, abscess epidural, peritonitis, enteritis, endophthalmitis, uveitis, septicemia with septic shock and multiorgan failure streptococcal toxic shock syndrome have also been reported.

In our country less than 20 cases of S. suis infection have been documented, so we believe interest communicate a new case of S. suis meningitis.