3rd RKI Bulletin: Did Lowering Drinking Water Temperatures in 2022 Affect Legionella Incidence?
The 33rd Epidemiological Bulletin of the Robert Koch Institute (RKI), published on August 15, 2024, presents the TESLI study (Temperature Reduction and Legionella Incidence), which investigates whether the inflation-driven lowering of operating temperatures in domestic hot water storage systems in 2022 led to an increase in the incidence of reported cases of Legionnaires' disease. The study also illustrates the trends in average drinking water temperatures over time and the proportion of households that lowered their water temperature. These data were correlated with the incidence of Legionnaires' disease cases at the state level. WATERcontrol was one of the six laboratories approached that provided the RKI with anonymized large-scale drinking water datasets from commercially used drinking water installations for analysis purposes. Legionnaires' disease is the most common form of legionellosis, which manifests as pneumonia caused by Legionella bacteria. Legionella are environmental microorganisms found in water that thrive [...]