Virology. 2004 Dec 20;330(2):501-5. Related Articles, Links  

 
Complete or near-complete nucleotide sequences of hepatitis E virus genome
recovered from a wild boar, a deer, and four patients who ate the deer.

Takahashi K, Kitajima N, Abe N, Mishiro S.

Department of Medical Sciences, Toshiba General Hospital, Shinagawa-ku, Tokyo
140-8522, Japan.

Zoonosis has been implicated in hepatitis E virus (HEV) transmission. We
examined wild boar living in a forest of Hyogo prefecture, Japan, and found HEV
RNA in three of seven boars. A full-genome HEV isolate from one of them was
revealed to be 99.7% identical to a previous isolate from a wild deer hunted in
the same forest and to those from four patients who contracted hepatitis E
after eating raw meat of the deer. These findings suggest an interspecies HEV
transmission between boar and deer in their wild life, and that both animals
might serve as an infection source for human beings as suggested previously.

PMID: 15567444 [PubMed - in process]

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