ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Public Health
Sec. Infectious Diseases: Epidemiology and Prevention
Volume 13 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fpubh.2025.1572482
This article is part of the Research TopicUnraveling Diarrheic Virus-Host Interactions: Mechanisms and ImplicationsView all 3 articles
Title：The outbreak of acute gastroenteritis caused by sapovirus at a school in Shenzhen, China,2023
Provisionally accepted
- 1Bao’an District Center for Public Health Services, Shenzhen, China
- 2Ban'an District Center for Disease Control and Prevention, Shenzhen, China
- 3Yuanhe District Center for Disease Control and Prevention, Shenzhen, China
- 4Jiangsu Provincial Center for Disease Control And Prevention, Nanjing, China
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Background: Between February 6 and 8,2023, an increasing number of students showed symptoms of vomiting in a school in Shenzhen, China. To identify the cause of this outbreak and curb disease spread on February 9, 2023, and an outbreak investigation including a case-control study was conducted. Methods: A structured questionnaire was used to collect the symptoms of all cases, a retrospective cohort study were conducted to examine the risk factors for diarrhea or vomiting. To find the contamination source, we investigated the environment all buildings in schools.Relative risk was presented and Chi-square test was performed. All the analyses were performed with OpenEpi software version 2.3.1 online. PCR was used to test stool specimens. Results: This outbreak was caused by sapovirus, and lasted for nine days. 70.9% of cases reported vomiting, 53.5% diarrhea, 38.4% bellyache, 14.0% feel nauseous, and 69.6% had diarrhea no more than twice. Eating food provided by the school or drinking water from direct-drinking machine was not associated with the acquisition of AGE based on univariate analysis. The students who had passed near a spot of vomit (<2.4m) were more likely to get AGE with a relative risk of 5.09 (95%CI:2.58,10.04). The case number with AGE in classrooms using standard operating procedure for vomit cleanup is obviously lower than that in ones not handling vomit according to the standard procedure (relative risk (RR):0.34, 95%CI:0.15,0.77).Sapovirus was the causative agent of this AGE outbreak, and airborne transmission was the primary route of infection. Prompt decontamination and the use of vomit bags significantly reduce the incidence of AGE while close contact with contaminated materials increases the risk of infection. These measures should be prioritized in public health strategies to prevent and control viral gastroenteritis outbreaks.
Keywords: Sapovirus, airborne transmission, prevention strategyies, cohort study, outbreak
Received: 07 Feb 2025; Accepted: 16 Apr 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Li, Huang, Wu, Zhang, Guo and Li. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence:
Hongxiong Guo, Jiangsu Provincial Center for Disease Control And Prevention, Nanjing, China
Yuan Li, Ban'an District Center for Disease Control and Prevention, Shenzhen, China
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