Our findings suggest that the average incubation period for invasive listeriosis is shorter than generally assumed.
We postulated that the current voluntary reporting system considerably underestimates the number of listeriosis cases.
We describe a nationwide outbreak of listeriosis linked to contaminated frankfurters and deli meats made at a single facility.
A single case of listeriosis was reported in 1999, but none has been reported since then.
To estimate the annual number of cases and the incidence of listeriosis we examined the data of 95 cases from 56 hospitals in 1996 -2002.
The clinical features of this outbreak were consistent with gastrointestinal listeriosis.
Molecular typing methods are widely used to supplement more established typing methods such as phage and serotyping and to support epidemiological investigations of listeriosis.
Following an improvement in local food production conditions, the number of culture-confirmed cases of listeriosis fell to only two in 1998.
