New Zoonotic Human Infection Associated with Bank Vole Paramyxovirus

Relevance. In 1973, while searching for the causative agent of HFRS, virus strains were isolated from bank voles that exhibited no cytopathogenicity in continuous human, monkey, and porcine kidney cell cultures. The HFRS virus was not detected in these cell cultures. It was only in 2017 that S. V. Alkhovsky et al. established that bank vole viruses (BVVs) belong to the Paramyxoviridae family. The question of BVVs involvement in human pathology remained open.

Аim. Establish the involvement of BVV in human pathology based on the detection of antibodies to this virus among outpatients and donors in the Tula and several other regions of the European part of Russia.

Materials & Methods. Viruses: paramyxovirus RP-12 strain, GenBank # MP943130. Sera from patients with suspected HFRS, as well as donor sera from several regions of Russia, were investigated. Antibodies to the BV virus detected by ELISA and immunoblotting.

Results. The BVV virus circulation and its etiological role in human disease was established according to virological testing, PCR analysis of the organs of bank voles and serological examination of patients diagnosed with fever of unknown etiology and other categories of patients, in the Tula, Ryazan, Voronezh, Saratov, Lipetsk, Moscow, Ulyanovsk regions and the Republic of Bashkortostan.The distribution of this new infection, as well as its clinical and epidemiological characteristics in European Russia, are consistent with HFRS associated with the Puumala virus.

Conclusion. We discover the new zoonotic human infection associated with bank vole paramyxovirus similar in epidemic characteristics to HFRS. In addition, two genotypes of the BV virus identified in the forest zone of European Russia.

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