[Annual distribution of serotypes of Salmonella, Shigella, and infantile enteropathogenic Escherichia coli in the Republic of Argentina, 1979-1981].

We report data of isolation of 3,665 strains of Salmonella, 1,855 of Shigella and 697 of E. coli infantile enteropathogenic (EPI) from different sources: human, animal, food and water, in Argentina during the triennium 1979-1981, considering their importance in the chain of transmission of enterobacteria. It appears that S. typhimurium is the most common among all the isolated serotypes of Salmonella, following in order of importance, S. oranienburg, S. derby, S. panama, S. agona, S. anatum, S. newport, S. bredeney and S. montevideo. It is important to emphasize the appearance of new Shigella serotypes in Argentina, particularly Sh. dysenteriae 2. We found that E. coli EPI 0111:B4 was the most frequent serotype and in 1981 the serotype 0112:B13 was also found.