Data from the United Kingdom and Alabama – where nine cases have been reported since last fall – suggest a possible adenovirus involvement. Adenoviruses generally attack the airways, causing cold-like illnesses. But they have been linked to inflammation and infection of the bladder, and occasionally to hepatitis, although rarely in children who are not immunosuppressed. In a statement issued late Thursday, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said it was working with Alabama to investigate the cases and work with other state health departments to determine if there were any other cases. In a warning to doctors, the Alabama Department of Public Health issued in early February said it knew of a case in another state but gave no details. advertising “The CDC is aware of and working with the Alabama Department of Public Health to investigate nine cases of hepatitis in children – ages 1 to 6 – who have also tested positive for adenovirus since October 2021,” said Kristen Nordlund, a spokeswoman for agency, he said in a statement. “The CDC is working with the state health services to see if there are any more cases in the US and what could be causing them. “Adenovirus may be the cause at the moment, but researchers are still learning more – including ruling out the most common causes of hepatitis.” advertising Karen Landers, an area physician for the Alabama Department of Public Health, said the cases have been identified in various parts of the state and investigations to date have found no links between the children. Investigators in the UK have also found no links between the cases there. “It is not uncommon to see children with severe hepatitis,” said Landers, who has been a pediatrician for 45 years, in an interview with STAT. “Seeing children with heavy [hepatitis] absence of serious underlying health problems is very rare. “That was what really set us apart in the state of Alabama.” There are a number of adenoviruses that can infect humans. Genetic sequencing is underway to determine if one or more types of adenoviruses are involved. To date, five of the children have tested positive for Press 41, Landers said. As information about the condition spreads, additional cases are likely to be found. The newspaper El País reported on Wednesday that Spain had identified three cases, all in children between the ages of 2 and 7. One of the children needed a liver transplant, the newspaper reported. As in the United Kingdom, children in Alabama were quite ill, said Helena Gutierrez, medical director of the Pediatric Liver Transplant Program at the University of Alabama at Birmingham. “We have seen a full range of cases from severe hepatitis to acute liver failure,” he told STAT in an email. Nirav Shah, director of the Maine Centers for Disease Control and president of the Association of State and Territorial Health Officers, said the agency was aware of cases in the UK but had not been informed of similar cases in that country. “We have contacted the US CDC to find out more as well as to discuss how states can monitor such cases,” he said. In the United Kingdom, where about 75 cases have been reported from England and Scotland, a small number of children have had or may need liver transplants. Some of the infected children in the UK tested positive for adenoviruses and SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes Covid-19. But the former appears to be the prime suspect, according to a science article on Scottish affairs published Thursday in the online journal Eurosurveillance. Even if the cause is an adenovirus infection, there may be a link to the pandemic, the authors suggest, noting that young children — many of them under the age of 5 — who have not been exposed to the normal range. during the pandemic they may have become more vulnerable when the masks were removed and the social distance measures lifted. “At the time of publication, the top hypotheses are centered around the adenovirus – either a new variant with a distinct clinical syndrome or a variant that is usually circulating that more severely affects younger children who are immunocompromised,” the authors wrote. Health of Scotland. the Royal Glasgow Children’s Hospital and the University of Glasgow Virus Research Center. “The latter scenario may be the result of limited social involvement during the Covid-19 pandemic,” they said. Five of the 13 children described in the article tested positive for adenovirus infection. Hepatitis – inflammation of the liver – is a condition that can be caused by a variety of factors, although often the cause is viral infections. A number of hepatitis viruses – A, B, C, D and E – are common causes of hepatitis, but have been ruled out in these cases. The European Center for Disease Control and Prevention issued a warning on Tuesday calling on doctors to be vigilant and report cases of acute hepatitis in children aged 16 and under, where tests rule out hepatitis A, B, C, D or E infection. .
