Novel Hybrid Viruses Caused Major Mid-Century Influenza Epidemics
It has been a mystery why unusually severe epidemics of influenza occur from time to time, such as in 1947 and 1951, when illness and mortality rates exceeded standard epidemic levels. The standard model of human influenza virus evolution holds that major influenza pandemics, the largest of which occurred in 1918, are caused by reassortment between human and avian influenza viruses. But seasonal influenza epidemics, which occur each winter in the United States, do not involve the reassortment of genetic material.
These new findings suggest that the evolution of seasonal influenza is more complex than previously thought, and that multiple forms of the same strain co-circulate and re-assort within a single population, rapidly generating genetically novel viruses with the potential to ignite major epidemics. It is therefore critical that intensive surveillance is undertaken to capture the full extent of influenza genetic diversity that co-circulates at a given time, particularly as an aid to vaccine design.
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Article adapted by Start Sanatate from original press release.
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Link to the published article.
CITATION:
Nelson MI, Viboud C, Simonsen L, Bennett RT, Griesemer SB, et al. (2008) Multiple Reassortment Events in the Evolutionary History of H1N1 Influenza A Virus Since 1918. PLoS Pathog 4(2): e1000012. doi:10.1371/journal.ppat.1000012
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Source: Mary Kohut
Public Library of Science
Roman hibrid majore cauzate de viruºi la mijlocul secolului epidemii de gripã - Novel Hybrid Viruses Caused Major Mid-Century Influenza Epidemics - articole medicale engleza - startsanatate