On March 14, 1991, physicians at a hospital in Guatemala City reported to the Institute of Nutrition of Central America and Panama (INCAP) that a 2-year-old boy living in an orphanage in Guatemala City had been hospitalized with dysentery; stool cultures yielded Shigella dysenteriae type 1. Another child from the orphanage had recently died from dysentery. During March 18-21, two other young children from the orphanage were diagnosed with S. dysenteriae type 1. On March 21, health officials in Rabinal, in the department of Baja Verapaz, reported more than 100 cases of dysentery to the Division of Epidemiology and Disease Control of the Ministry of Health (MOH). This report summarizes the investigation of these outbreaks.
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