It was already clarified that the isolates of Staphylococcus aureus, which had been implicated in food poisoning outbreaks, were strictly restricted to the organisms belonged to the coagulase types II, III, VI or VII. In this investigation, a total of 3, 590 specimens consisted of 720 foods, swabs of 280 chopping boards, swabs of 280 table wares, swabs of fingers of 470 food handlers, and 50 nasal swabs and 1, 790 feces obtained from healthy human was examined for the presence of S. aureus.
Serological classification of the isolates was also made by means of the coagulase typing procedure.
Results obtained are summarized as follows:
1) A total of 471 strains of S. aureus was isolated from the above mentioned specimens throughout the investigation.
2) Detection rates of the organism were varied according to the specimens, i. e., 15% from foods, 9.3% from swabs of chopping boards, 5.4% from swabs of table wares, 26.0% from swabs of food handlers' fingers, 13.2% from nasal swabs and 10.8% from healthy humans feces, respectively.
3) All the isolates were typed into 7 coagulase types, viz., 17 isolates as type I, 54 as type II, 82 as type III, 101 as type IV, 54 as type V, 52 as type VI and 111 as type VII, respectively.
4) From the viewpoint of food poisoning prevention, it was noteworthy that 75 out of 108 (69.4%) isolates from food, 22 out of 26 (84.6%) from chopping board, 82 out of 122 (67.2%) from food handlers' finger and 20 out of 29 (68.9%) from feces of healthy humans were the organisms belonged to the coagulase types II, III, VI or VII, since these are regarded as a causal agent of staphylococcal food poisoning.
