How CDC Tracks Shiga Toxin-Producing E. coli

CDC tracks Shiga toxin-producing E. coli (STEC) nationally through passive surveillance of laboratory-confirmed human STEC isolates in the United States.

From the clinic to CDC

1. Clinical diagnostic laboratories send STEC O157 isolates and Shiga toxin-positive broths to state and territorial public health laboratories.
2. Those laboratories characterize them further and report the isolates electronically to CDC.
3. The reports are collected in the Laboratory-based Enteric Disease Surveillance (LEDS) system.
4. Unusual or untypable isolates — and toxin-positive samples from which the state laboratory could not isolate STEC — go to CDC's National Escherichia and Shigella Reference Laboratory, which reports results back to the laboratory that sent them.

Annual summaries of LEDS data are the national source of serotype information for STEC. The page links the 2017 and 2016 reports; earlier years are on CDC Stacks.

Data tools

Other CDC systems that track E. coli

• Animal Contact Outbreak Surveillance System: outbreaks of human enteric illness linked to contact with animals
• Foodborne Disease Outbreak Surveillance System
• Foodborne Disease Active Surveillance Network (FoodNet): active surveillance for foodborne diseases
• National Antimicrobial Resistance Monitoring System: annual reports on antimicrobial resistance surveillance
• Waterborne Disease Surveillance Reports

Sources

Based on "E. coli Surveillance," Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, February 28, 2024; a work of the United States government in the public domain.