West Nile Virus from transplant
September 2, 2002
West Nile Virus from transplant - CNN
ATLANTA, Georgia (CNN) -- U.S. health authorities are investigating whether
four patients in Florida and Georgia -- including one who has died -- could
have been infected with the West Nile virus through transplanted organs.
The virus previously was considered a mosquito-borne threat only, a
spokesman for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said Sunday.
The four patients received organs from a Georgia woman, who was killed early
last month in a car accident. The woman, who donated her heart, kidneys and
liver, had been given several blood transfusions before she died, the CDC
said.
Health officials do not know if the woman was infected with the virus, but
all four patients became ill after receiving her organs.
"Preliminary evidence suggests that these illnesses may be due to West Nile
virus infection," the CDC said.
One Georgia recipient died of encephalitis, and an autopsy found his
evidence "consistent with West Nile or related virus infection," the CDC
said Sunday in a statement.
"The CDC is exploring the possibility that West Nile virus may have been
transmitted through donated organs," CDC spokesman Tom Skinner said.
The CDC planned to test the heart transplant recipient in Miami after
Florida health officials confirmed the man was infected with the virus,
Skinner said.
If the human-to-human transmission is confirmed, it would be the first known
case of its kind. It also would pose a problem for public health
authorities. No Food and Drug Administration-approved test is available to
screen donated organs for the virus.
All previously documented cases of West Nile infection in people are
believed to have come from mosquitoes. Public health officials emphasize
that the virus cannot be transmitted through casual contact with an infected
person.
The West Nile epidemic exploded this summer, three years after it was first
detected in birds, horses and eventually humans in the northeastern United
States.
At least 555 cases have been confirmed across 26 states and the District of
Columbia, according to the CDC, and 28 deaths have been attributed to the
disease.
More than a third of the infections have been in Louisiana, where eight
people have died.
-- CNN Medical News Producer Miriam Falco contributed to this report.