New, Resurgent, and Surprising Viruses

▪ 1996

      The smallest of the microbes, the viruses, provoked the greatest concern in 1995. Australian scientists reported in April that they had identified the cause of a puzzling 1994 outbreak that killed several horses and their trainer. The culprit was a new virus, a member of the family that includes the measles virus and the organism responsible for canine distemper.

      An epidemic of Ebola virus in Africa prompted increased awareness of the potential dangers of so-called hot viruses, which cause deadly and virtually untreatable diseases in humans and other animals. Between January and April, 189 people in southwestern Zaire developed an acute illness marked by fever, vomiting, and bloody diarrhea. About a third of them died. Epidemiologists from the World Health Organization (WHO) soon incriminated the Ebola virus and initiated measures to prevent further spread of the infection. By August, when WHO announced that the epidemic was over, 315 people had become ill, and 77% of them were dead.

      In 1989 a fatal disease among laboratory monkeys imported into the U.S. from the Philippines had been linked to an Ebola-type virus. In their search for the origin of the Zaire outbreak, the WHO investigators captured over 3,000 birds, rodents, and other animals, plus several thousand insects, but failed to pinpoint the source of the virus.

      Firm evidence of a link between primates and Ebola virus infection in humans did come to light, however. In May French scientists reported that they had isolated a new strain of the virus from a researcher who became infected in Côte d'Ivoire while performing an autopsy on a chimpanzee. The troop in the wild to which the animal belonged had recently been decimated by a hemorrhagic disease similar to that caused in humans by the Ebola virus.

      That even relatively familiar viruses are capable of surprises was underlined by a report from Sweden of the mysterious spread of hepatitis C virus among 37 patients in a hospital ward. Although this virus is usually transmitted by intravenous drug abuse or through contaminated blood or donor organs, the Swedish scientists were convinced that it had not been spread via the usual routes or as a result of any lapse in hygiene. They concluded that the virus had been transmitted by some other, as-yet-unrecognized route—possibly through the air.

      Another surprise in 1995 was the publication of research from London and Glasgow, Scotland, indicating that childhood diabetes is related to infection with Coxsackie B viruses (relatives of the poliovirus). Although diabetes involves a genetic predisposition, environmental factors are also thought to play a role. The researchers found the genetic material of Coxsackie viruses in blood samples from 9 of 14 children at the onset of diabetes but in only 2 of 45 healthy children. This finding did not prove causation but was highly suggestive. (BERNARD DIXON)

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