What is Cholera?

Cholera is an acute, diarrheal illness caused by infection of the intestine with the bacterium Vibrio cholerae. The infection is often mild or without symptoms, but sometimes it can be severe. Approximately 1 in 20 infected persons has severe disease characterized by profuse watery diarrhea, vomiting, and leg cramps. In these persons, rapid loss of body fluids leads to dehydration and shock. Without treatment, death can occur within hours. A person may get cholera by drinking water or eating food contaminated with the cholera bacterium. In an epidemic, the source of the contamination is usually the feces of an infected person. The disease can spread rapidly in areas with inadequate treatment of sewage and drinking water. Cholera often occurs in outbreaks or epidemics. For information on treatment, prevention, and control click here. Photo: Vibrio cholerae bacteria seen through an electron microscope.

Feature article: From Square 1 to Peru-15: an in-depth look at the pursuit of a cholera vaccine.

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Research News

Featuring Harvard Medical School and Affiliated Hospitals

Cholera Makes Protein Analogous to Formin/Spire Hybrid-like Actin
Found to cause changes in cell structure and promote intestinal colonization.

International Collaborations in Infectious Disease Research.
The ICIDR is a collaboration between Harvard, the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, and the International Centre for Diarrhoeal Disease Research in Bangladesh (ICDDR/B: Centre for Health and Population Research) to elucidate immune responses and protection from cholera infection in an endemic population.

Research Stories

From the Harvard University Gazette

Cholera Vaccine Developed.
Vaccine contains enlarged toxin-free bacteria that stalls above the lower intestine where the body's immune system spots and kills them.

>More HU Gazette on Cholera

Scientific Reports

From HMS Faculty Newsletter Focus

New Antibiotic Aims to Tame Bacterial Toxins
Disarming Cholera Takes Punch out of Pathogen

Cholera Bacteria Break from Biofilm to Cause Disease.
Quorum sensing results in the breakdown of cholera's biofilm communities, freeing the bugs in the small intestines where they do more damage as individual cells.

Unique Genes Found
Unique genes found in 7th pandemic cholera strain.

>More Research Reports5