Melbourne, Jan 23 (PTI) A virus called Enterovirus D68may be the cause of a mysterious polio-like illness that hasparalysed children in the US, Canada and Europe, scientistssay.
Researchers at University of New South Wales (UNSW) inAustralia analysed the scientific literature on the conditionknown as acute flaccid myelitis.
"In 2014, children in the US began to be diagnosed with amystery illness that caused a polio-like paralysis," saidProfessor Raina MacIntyre of UNSW.
"More than 120 children developed the condition, known asacute flaccid myelitis, in the US alone but experts werebaffled as to the cause," said MacIntyre, who led the studypublished in the journal Eurosurveillance.
That same year there were also unusually large outbreaksof infection with Enterovirus D68, or EV-D68 - a virus knownsince the early 1960s to cause runny noses, coughs, muscleaches, fever and difficulty breathing.
About 2,280 people in the US, Canada and Europe wereinfected with the virus, many of them children, and theirrespiratory symptoms were more severe than usual, researcherssaid.
Clusters of the paralysing illness, also mostly inchildren, were reported in the same regions, they said.
"This raised the possibility of a link between EV-D68 andacute flaccid myelitis. However, the virus had never beenknown to cause paralysis before," said MacIntyre.
The team applied the Bradfield Hill criteria - a set ofnine principles developed to determine causality. The methodused to prove that smoking caused cancer is now an acceptedtool to determine causality.
"We are first to use his approach to analyse therelationship between EV-D68 and acute flaccid myelitis. Ourresults show that it is very likely that EV-D68 is the causeof the mystery illness and the paralysis of children," saidMacIntyre.
"The incidence of EV-D68 infections is increasingworldwide, and a genetically distinct strain has recentlyevolved.
"There is no treatment or vaccine for the polio-likeillness caused by EV-D68, which makes it important to actquickly to stop outbreaks," said MacIntyre. PTI SARSAR.
This is unedited, unformatted feed from the Press Trust of India wire.