Two outbreaks of food poisoning due to Salmonella sp. (1) serovars Enteritidis and Litchfield occurred at two hotels in Shizuoka Prefecture in July and September, 1989. Raw fish “shimasuzuki” served at the restaurants in the hotels were presumed to be the food responsible for both outbreaks. So, we examined “simasuzuki” cultured in freshwater and the environments of the fish pond for the presence of Salmonella. S. Enteritidis and S. Lithfield were isolated from “shimasuzuki”, the fish pond and patients and the isolates were examined for the drug susceptibilities, phage-types and plasmid profiles. Approximately 78% (7/9) of S. Enteritidis isolates were of phage type 8. All S. Litchfield isolates were resistant to erythromycin. Some of the plasmids were unique to each of the serovars implicated in these outbreaks and their molecular sizes were 36-MDa for S. Enteritidis and 1.4-and 2.2-MDa for S. Litchfield. The drug susceptibilities, phagetypes and plasmid profiles were useful epidemiological markers for these outbreaks.
