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Why has the El Tor biotype contributed to the spread of the seventh cholera pandemic?
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cholera
A woman with cholera being treated by nurses at St. Nicholas Hospital in Saint-Marc, Haiti, 2010.
The El Tor biotype has been a primary driver of the seventh cholera pandemic due to two key epidemiological characteristics that distinguish it from the classical biotype responsible for earlier outbreaks.1
- Environmental Resilience: El Tor is a significantly hardier organism than the classical biotype, allowing it to survive for extended periods in aquatic environments. This durability facilitates its persistence and transmission through water sources.1
- Asymptomatic Transmission: Many individuals infected with the El Tor biotype experience only mild symptoms or remain entirely asymptomatic. Unlike severely ill patients, who are often incapacitated, these individuals are more likely to travel, inadvertently spreading the bacterium across regions and continents.1
As global commerce and personal travel have increased, these traits have allowed the El Tor biotype to move rapidly across borders, turning cholera into a persistent, endemic burden in many impoverished nations. The bacterium is typically introduced to new regions through human activity, as seen in the 2010 outbreak in Haiti, where it contaminated local water supplies.213