Invasive meningococcal disease at a military base in Warsaw, January 2007

On 5 January 2007, two soldiers from a military base in Warsaw, Poland, presented with symptoms indicating fulminant sepsis. The soldiers were admitted to intensive care units in two different hospitals. Neisseria meningitidis was isolated from blood and cerebrospinal fluid in the case of one patient and from blood only in the case of the other, and sent to the National Reference Centre for Bacterial Meningitis (NRCBM) for further characterisation.