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A virus first observed in 2004 in Bolivia re-emerged in the country in 2019, with the first proven cases of human-to-human transmission.
While the global health crisis linked to the Covid-19 pandemic is still far from over, the reappearance of a mysterious virus, discovered in 2004 in Bolivia and producing symptoms similar to Ebola, worries the scientific community.
This virus, baptized Chapare in reference to the province where it was unearthed, it returned to prominence in 2019, when several people were treated for hemorrhagic fever in a hospital in La Paz, the Bolivian capital, explains the specialized site EurekAlert.
Chapare’s human-to-human transmission, a first
Five people, including a young resident doctor, an ambulance driver and a gastroenterologist, were infected because they had come into contact with these patients. Two of them died, though a total of three deaths out of eight cases identified.
And if doctors are concerned about the reappearance of this virus, it is in particular because these contaminations constitute the first description of human-to-human transmission of the Chapare virus.
Several scientists then expressed their concern during a presentation made by researchers from the American government agency Center for Disease Control (CDC), during the congress of theAmerican Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene (ASTMH), which was held from 15 to 19 November.
How is it transmitted?
As Futura Sciences points out, Chapare’s mode of transmission remains relatively enigmatic. But it appears that the virus can pass from one human to another from contaminated biological fluids (blood, urine, saliva, semen).
“We now believe that many body fluids can potentially carry the virus”added Caitlin Cossaboom, an epidemiologist at the CDC.
Transmitted by rodents?
The scientist also believes that the disease it could be transmitted by rats. “The RNA genomic sequence we isolated from the rodent samples matched quite well what we saw in human cases.”he explains.
What symptoms?
Patients with Chapare virus suffered from it fever, abdominal pain, vomiting, bleeding gums, rash and pain behind the eyes.
To date, there is no known treatment for this disease.
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