Introduction Neonatal meningitis causes substantial morbidity and mortality and is commonly caused by GBS. Moraxella osloensis is an aerobic, gram-negative coccobacillus infrequently isolated from CSF. There is little published related to risk factors of M. osloensis infections in the paediatric population. We report a case of Moraxella meningitis a neonate and review of cases in children.

Case report A 2 day old neonate was referred for jaundice and bilirubin check. He was noted to be jaundiced and lethargic. He was born at term complicated with maternal pyrexia and raised maternal inflammatory markers. He was discharged on day1 following 12 h of satisfactory observation.

A full septic screen was performed on the baby in-view of risk factor for sepsis. The biochemical work-up was suggestive of meningitis. The blood and CSF culture were negative; however the CSF PCR was positive for Moraxella Oslonesis.

He was treated with 3 week course of IV cefotaxime and discharged without any acute complications.

Discussion A PubMed search yielded 4 published cases of M. osloensis meningitis but none of them presented in the neonatal period. There was 1 published case of neonatal septicemia without meningitis, however there was no specific risk factor identified in any of these patients.

In conclusion, although M. osloensis meningitis is rare it may cause severe CNS infection in children we were able to definitely identify the species of the isolates only by using 16S rRNA gene sequencing and extended PCR must be performed on all babies presenting with possible meningitis.