Enterovirus D68

Enteroviruses are a genus of positive-sense single-stranded RNA viruses associated with several human and mammalian diseases. Serologic studies have distinguished 71 human enterovirus serotypes on the basis of antibody neutralization tests. poliomyelitis was the most significant disease caused by an enterovirus, poliovirus. There are 64 non-polio enteroviruses that can cause disease in humans.

Symptoms: EV-D68 can cause mild to severe respiratory illness. Mild symptoms may include fever, runny nose, sneezing, cough, and body and muscle aches. Severe symptoms may include wheezing and difficulty breathing.

Diagnosis: EV-D68 can only be diagnosed by doing specific lab tests on specimens from a person's nose and throat, or blood. Many hospitals and some doctor's offices can test ill patients to see if they have enterovirus infection.PCR test is used to detect the EV-D68.

Treament: There is no specific treatment and no vaccine, so the illness has to run its course; treatment is directed against symptoms (symptomatic treatment). Most people recover completely; however, some need to be hospitalized, and some have died as a result of the virus. Five EV68 paralysis cases were unsuccessfully treated with steroids, intravenous immunoglobulin and/or plasma exchange.

Epidemology: Since its discovery in 1962, EV68 had been described mostly sporadically in isolated cases. Six clusters (equal to or more than 10 cases) or outbreaks between 2005 and 2011 have been reported from the Philippines, Japan, the Netherlands, and the states of Georgia, Pennsylvania and Arizona in the United States. EV68 was found in 2 of 5 children during a 2012/13 cluster of polio-like disease in California.