[ad_1]
A veterinarian in China has died after dissecting two monkeys and being infected with the monkey B virus (not to be confused with monkeypox, which was recently documented in America).
the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reports that the 53-year-old worked at a laboratory in Beijing specializing in non-human primate breeding and experimental research. The researcher dissected two monkeys that died in early March 2021 and began to experience nausea and vomiting followed by fever and neurological symptoms a month later.
After several hospital stays, he finally died on May 27. Two of his relatives, a doctor and a nurse, tested negative for the virus.
Monkey B virus (aka B virus, Macacine herpesvirus 1, or McHV-1) is a rare but fascinating virus. It typically infects macaque monkeys and is genetically very similar to herpes simplex virus 1 (HSV-1), the ubiquitous virus that causes cold sores in humans. Like HSV-1, it is a neurotropic virus capable of infecting nerve cells. When it infects macaques, the B virus causes lesions that resemble cold sores. However, when humans are zoonotically infected with the monkey B virus, it can cause severe inflammation of the brain, leading to permanent neurological dysfunction or death.
This recent case in Beijing is the first fatal case reported in China of a monkey B virus infection. Since it was first described in 1932, around 50 people have been documented to have infections; 21 of them died, according to the United States Center for Disease Control and Prevention.
In 1997, 22-year-old researcher Elizabeth Griffin was working with infected macaques at the Yerkes National Primate Research Center in Atlanta when one of the monkeys threw a tiny drop of fluid in her eye. Six weeks later, she died of complications from an infection with the monkey B virus.
As suggested, the virus can be transmitted from macaque to humans through contact with their saliva, feces, urine, and brain tissue. Lab workers, zookeepers, and veterinarians working with macaques are most at risk of infection – although hundreds of people are scratched by monkeys in the United States each year and infections remain extremely rare , notes the US CDC.
However, researchers are increasingly aware that wild macaques in the wild can be infected with the monkey b virus and could potentially expose people to infection. In 2018, a case report found that up to 30% of monkeys living in and around Silver Springs State Park in Florida could be infected with the virus.
Fortunately, there has only ever been a single reported case of an infected person transmitting the B virus to another person. In this case, reported in 1990, three people were infected with the virus at a research facility in Florida. A fourth person, with no direct connection in the lab, then was apparently infected after rubbing cream on skin that had been accidentally contaminated with the virus by one of the three infected.
THIS WEEK IN IFLSCIENCE
Get our greatest science stories delivered to your inbox every week!
[ad_2]
Source link