1/4. Detection of the new human coronavirus HKU1: a report of 6 cases. BACKGROUND: Human coronavirus HKU1 (HCoV-HKU1), a new group 2 coronavirus, was first characterized in 2005 from 2 adults with pneumonia in hong kong, china. To the best of our knowledge, there is no other report to date about the detection of this new virus. We report a molecular method allowing for the detection of HCoV-HKU1 and also report the clinical presentation of 6 infected patients. methods: We screened 141 specimens (135 nasal samples and 6 stool samples) received in February and March 2005 in our laboratory and obtained from 135 hospitalized patients (61.5% of whom were <5 years old and 34.1% of whom were >20 years old) for HCoV-HKU1. RESULTS: HCoV-HKU1 was detected in 6 (4.4%) of the 135 nasal specimens and in 2 (33.3%) of the 6 stool samples; the positive samples were obtained from 6 patients (5 children and 1 adult). The clinical presentation of these 6 patients was as follows: 3 were admitted to the hospital for acute enteric disease resulting in severe dehydration associated with upper respiratory symptoms; 1 had fever, otitis, and febrile seizure; 1 had a sample obtained to investigate failure to thrive; and 1 had a sample obtained for exploration of X-linked agammaglobulinemia and hyperleucocytosis. CONCLUSION: HCoV-HKU1 can be detected in respiratory and stool samples from children and adults in a part of the world other than hong kong. Our results suggest that HCoV-HKU1 could be associated with respiratory and enteric diseases, and its detection can be related to a persistent asymptomatic infection in patients with poor underlying conditions. ( info) |
2/4. Fatal gastroenteritis associated with coronaviruslike particles. The role of human enteric coronaviruses in infantile gastroenteritis is controversial. We detected coronaviruslike particles in the intestinal contents and within the epithelial cells of the ileum in a 15-month-old infant who had postmortem evidence of severe enteritis. Ultrastructural findings consistent with in vivo coronavirus replication in the human small intestine support a causative role for this agent in gastroenteritis. ( info) |
3/4. Chronic enterocyte infection with coronavirus. One possible cause of the syndrome of tropical sprue? A man with a gastrojejunostomy and intestinal malabsorption was found to be excreting large numbers of coronavirus-like particles in his stools over a period of at least eight months. coronavirus-like particles were found in vesicles in degenerating jejunal enterocytes in all of five jejunal biopsies. In a review of electron micrographs, similar structures were found in biopsies from three of 12 patients with classical chronic tropical sprue and in one patient with a sprue-like syndrome associated with agammaglobulinaemia. The hypothesis is advanced that infection with this virus may produce enterocyte damage and may be one cause of the syndrome of tropical sprue. ( info) |
| The nasal epithelium from a young girl was examined by electron microscopy and found to be infected by coronavirus. Virions are seen within and outside the ciliated cells, but not outside or within the goblet cells or other cells of the nasal mucosa. Some virions are located near the microvilli, others in pockets in the apical cell membrane. The cytoplasm contains many small vesicles with a single virion, large apical vesicles containing hundreds of virions, and lysosome-like cytosomes with a moderate number of virions. Some virus-like particles devoid of an electron-dense interior are seen both in the cytosomes and extracellularly. Virus budding was observed in the golgi apparatus but nowhere else in the cell. The ciliated cells seem not to be destroyed by the viruses, although in many cases the cilia are withdrawn into the cell body. The loss of cilia is likely to cause rhinorrhoea. ( info) |