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The authors declare that they have no competing interests. Authors’ contributions CT was involved in the conception and design of the study, sampling, bacterial isolation, molecular characterization using AFLPs and VNTRs, data analyses selleck screening library and who wrote the manuscript. NAR performed DNA extraction, the evaluation of 3 VNTR loci, VNTR data analyses and drafting of the manuscript. LP contributed in the evaluation 3 VNTR loci, VNTR data analyses and drafting of the manuscript. CM carried the sampling and data acquisition. AT participated in the data acquisition and revised the content of the manuscript. SR was involved in the conception and design of the study, drafting from and revising the manuscript. RK was involved in the conception and design of the study and the design of the VNTR strategy. AB participated in the conception and design of the project, funding acquisition,

editing and revisiting of manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.”
“Background Although group B Streptococcus (GBS, Streptococcus agalactiae) was originally described as a cause of mastitis in bovines, it has emerged as an important opportunistic pathogen in humans. GBS is typically a commensal in the urogenital and lower gastrointestinal tracts of healthy adults, and pregnant women can transmit the bacterium to their baby during childbirth. Newborns infected with GBS can develop life threatening infections including pneumonia, sepsis, and meningitis. GBS has also been shown to cause disease in the elderly and adults with underlying medical conditions where skin and soft tissue infections, urinary tract infections, and bacteremia can result [1]. Molecular epidemiological studies utilizing multilocus sequence typing (MLST) have shown that the distribution of GBS lineages varies by source. Strains belonging to clonal complex (CC)-17 and CC-19, for example, more frequently caused newborn disease compared to strains of other CCs [2–4], with CC-17 strains causing more cases of meningitis and late-onset disease [2].