The thick-borne encephalitis caused by alimentary transmission - case series report

Abstract

Tick-borne encephalitis (TBE) is a central nervous system zoonotic disease transmitted by ticks. Tick-borne encephalitis virus (TBEV) is one of the main causes of lymphocytic meningitis in the areas of its endemic occurrence. A mode of transmission of TBEV which is rarely observed in clinical practice is an alimentary transmission through consumption of unpasteurised dairy products from infected animals. The following article contains detailed description of the clinical course of TBE among five family members, for whom the occurrence of TBE was temporarily associated with the consumption of unpasteurised goat's milk from the same source. The epidemiological outbreak presented in this article is the fifth ever described case of the milk-borne TBE in Poland. More so, the clinical course of the disease has shown differences from the typical course characterised so far in the literature. Clinical cases of TBE described in this study were similar to infections caused by tick bites in humans. The following article discusses available methods of preventing TBE, with emphasis on alimentary transmission of TBEV, since possibility of serious detrimental long-term neurological complications resulting from TBE was stressed in prior literature.

Keywords: alimentary transmission; goat milk; milk-borne TBE; tick-borne encephalitis.