Skin infections caused by Streptococcus pyogenes after the Eid Al-Adha

Introduction:Streptococcus pyogenes is Gram-positive bacteria in chain form. Infections typically begin in the throat and skin, although they present with a many different clinical cases. This study aimed to present a different clinical manifestation related to S. pyogenes. Methods:In this study, swab samples were taken from patients who came to our center with skin lesions after Eid al-Adha. Identification was performed using conventional methods (bacitracin susceptibility test and PYR test) and VITEK 2 (bioMerieux, Marcy l'Etoile, France). Phylogenetic tree was generated using the Tamura Nei model of Neighbor-joining method in MEGA 6.0 program. Results:All of the isolated microorganisms were defined as S. pyogenes. Phylogenetic tree revealed that strains were highly related, but there were genetic differences between the strains. Conclusion:While Orf virus (Parapoxvirus) is the most common cause of skin lesions after Eid al-Adha, S. pyogenes was found to be the causative agent in our study. To our knowledge, cases of S. pyogenes skin infection due to religious practices have been reported for the first time.