The phrase "a small outbreak of" is correct and usable in written English.
It can be used to describe a minor occurrence or spread of something, typically in the context of diseases or events.
Example: "The health department reported a small outbreak of flu cases in the community last week."
Alternatives: "a minor incident of" or "a limited occurrence of".
There has been a small outbreak of cases in Europe, with 13 cases identified by health officials since June last year.
It all may have started with the terror caused by a small outbreak of bubonic plague in India a few years back.
They are also well aware how even a small outbreak of that sort could put them under severe media and political pressure.
The open-air test of a Soviet smallpox weapon in 1971 caused a small outbreak of the disease in a port on the Aral Sea, in what is now Kazakhstan, even among people who had been vaccinated.
In 1976, after a small outbreak of swine influenza at Fort Dix in New Jersey, public-health officials persuaded President Gerald R. Ford and Congress to mount a nationwide immunization campaign that came in for widespread criticism.
Agricultural bioterrorism is also efficient: it would take only a small outbreak of, say, karnal bunt, a wheat disease, before foreign countries started to ban imports.It is not just terrorists who might wield such weapons: so might rival wheat producers.
Groups of Zimbabwe African National Liberation Army ZANLAA) fighters attacked both ZIPRA and the government forces during the revolt, which followed a smaller outbreak of fighting between guerrillas in November 1980.
39 A smaller outbreak of 21 confirmed cases occurred in central Borikhamxay province during Laos New Year in 2004.
Ebola nearly killed Nancy Writebol in July and it also made her famous, which helped broadcast to the world that it needed to respond more aggressively to what had grown from a small outbreak into an out-of-control epidemic.
In France, a small outbreak (14 cases) of Newport MDR-AmpC was detected in 2003 and linked to consumption of imported horse meat (12 ).
A close genomic relationship between four isolates, twinned with a 3-week overlap in ward occupancy, provided evidence of a second small outbreak of MDR-Aci, which from PFGE results on three of the isolates could be assigned to pulsotype 29 (Table 3).
