Clonal Distribution and Differential Occurrence of the Enterotoxin Gene Cluster, <i>egc</i> , in Carriage- versus Bacteremia-Associated Isolates of <i>Staphylococcus aureus</i>

Abstract

The Staphylococcus aureus enterotoxin gene cluster, egc, was detected in isolates from healthy individuals and in those from patients with bacteremia. The egc genes cooccur and are slightly enriched in strains from healthy carriers (present in 63.7% of carriage-associated isolates versus 52.9% of invasive isolates; P = 0.03). Multilocus sequence typing revealed that successful staphylococcal clones usually harbor the egc locus.