The number of cases, according to the UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) weekly Notifiable diseases: causative agents reports for 2025 (often referred to as NOID’s Notification of infectious diseases), indicate there is a strong possibility that an outbreak of E.coli O157 occurred for an eighteen-week period.
Please note this data is updated weekly and often changes in future weeks. After that it is checked for accuracy and eligibility before the end of the year totals can be confirmed by the UKHSA.
The number of cases on the NOID’s data is consistently higher than usual from week 29 (week ending 21stJuly 2025) to week 40 (week ending 5thOctober) but cases first increased above a normal level from week 25 although it was in the summer, which is traditionally when the highest number of cases of E.coli O157 are recorded.
Week 37 (week ending 14thSeptember 2025) was the worst as it shows 37 reported cases of E.coli O157 to the UKHSA.
If I am correct, what concerns me is how quiet the UKHSA have been about this. Yes, I do appreciate how much work they have to undertake, but I believe in order to help prevent person to person spread of such, it is of vital importance that when such outbreaks occur, they inform the public even if the source remains unknown, as it can help, even in a small way, in preventing such cases by reinforcing good hygiene messages such as the importance of washing your hands.
E.coli O157 is a Shiga toxin-producing Escherichia coli (STEC) and presently the largest reported STEC in the UK. However, there are many other non O157 types and there are about 1500 confirmed cases of Non O157 each year. These Non O157 STEC’s are increasingly being detected due to better laboratory diagnostics and overall, they now make up the majority of cases in the UK.
We are unable to report about the number of cases of Non O157 STEC’s in 2025 as the UKHSA do not publish these on a weekly basis, despite us asking them to do so.
According to the Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs (Defra) approximately 33% of Shiga toxin-producing Escherichia coli (STEC) cases were hospitalised in the 5 years up to the end of 2023,
According to NOID’s data, unfortunately it appears the number of reported cases of E.coli O157 in 2025 is going to increase again this year and may be higher than in the previous years 2023 & 2024.
