Seven people fell sick in a Salmonella outbreak in Australia in 2024 after eating kangaroo meat. A Salmonella Muenchen outbreak occurred in August 2024 after consuming wild hunted kangaroo in the Northern Territory (NT). Of the seven people who shared the food, all became ill; three were confirmed and four were probable cases.
The median age was 32 with a range of 23 to 65 years old and six were male. The median incubation period was 24 hours but ranged from 6 to 30 hours. The main symptoms were diarrhea and abdominal pain.
Two people were admitted to hospital overnight but all cases recovered. According to a study published in the journal Communicable Diseases Intelligence , all seven cases knew each other and consumed the same meal – a single, locally hunted and butchered kangaroo. Salmonella Muenchen is not uncommon in the Northern Territory.
Between 2014 and 2023, 87 notifications were received. A 2017 Salmonella Muenchen outbreak in the state with 22 cases was linked to hunted turtle meat. Multiple exposures Kangaroo meat is a staple food of Australia’s First Nations people and has become popular amongst non-Indigenous Australians in recent decades.
Kangaroos are known to harbor Salmonella. At the end of August 2024, the NT Centre for Disease Control was alerted to a possible outbreak of salmonellosis among people who had consumed wild hunted kangaroo. It was detected while investigating routine salmonellosis notifications; three cases separately attended the Alice S.
