Saffold Cardioviruses in Children with Diarrhea | CDC EID

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Volume 17, Number 6–June 2011
Letter
Saffold Cardioviruses in Children with Diarrhea, Thailand
Pattara Khamrin, Natthawan Chaimongkol, Nattika Nantachit, Shoko Okitsu, Hiroshi Ushijima, and Niwat Maneekarn
Author affiliations: Chiang Mai University, Chiang Mai, Thailand (P. Khamrin, N. Chaimongkol, N. Maneekarn); Mahidol University, Bangkok, Thailand (N. Nantachit); and Nihon University School of Medicine, Tokyo, Japan (S. Okitsu, H. Ushijima)


Suggested citation for this article

To the Editor: Cardioviruses currently consist of at least 3 viruses: Theiler murine encephalomyocarditis virus, encephalomyocarditis virus, and Saffold virus (SAFV) (1–4). Saffold cardiovirus in the family Picornaviridae was isolated and identified from fecal specimens of a child with fever of unknown origin in the United States (3).

Several reports have documented the presence of SAFV in fecal samples and respiratory secretions (5–10). However, it is not clear whether SAFV is associated with any disease, including gastroenteritis in humans, and epidemiologic data for SAFV are limited. We report an epidemiologic survey of SAFV in children hospitalized with diarrhea in Chiang Mai, Thailand.

A total of 150 fecal specimens were obtained from children hospitalized with acute gastroenteritis in Chiang Mai during January–December 2007. Patient ages ranged from >1 to 5 years. SAFV in fecal specimens was detected by using a nested PCR and primers specific for the virus 5′ untranslated region (7). A negative control was also included to monitor any contamination that might have occurred during the PCR.

SAFVs detected were further analyzed by amplification of the viral protein (VP) 1 gene (6,9,10) and direct sequencing of the VP1 PCR amplicon by using the BigDye Terminator Cycle Sequencing Kit (Applied Biosystems, Foster City, CA, USA). VP1 sequence was compared with VP1 sequences of reference strains available in the National Center for Biotechnology Information (Bethesda, MD, USA). Phylogenetic and molecular evolutionary analyses were conducted by using MEGA4 (www.megasoftware.net). Nucleotide sequences of SAFV strains described were deposited in GenBank under accession nos. HQ668170–HQ668173.

Four (2.7%) of 150 specimens were positive for SAFV (CMH023/2007, CMH038/2007, CMH045/2007, and CMH143/2007). Two of these specimens (CMH023/2007 and CMH038/2007) were obtained in February 2007, one (CMH045/2007) in March 2007, and 1 (CMH143/2007) in November 2007. Co-infections with other viruses were detected in all 4 samples. Two specimens (CMH023/2007and CMH045/2007), were co-infected with noroviruses GII/16 and GII/4 genotypes, respectively. One SAFV-positive sample (CMH038/2007) was co-infected with a group A rotavirus G1P[8] genotype, and another (CMH143/2007) was co-infected with human parechovirus.

All SAFV-positive specimens were further amplified for the VP1 gene to determine their phylogenetic lineages and genetic relationships with other SAFV reference strains. When we used 3 sets of primers used in other studies (6,9,10) for amplification of the VP1 gene, this gene was amplified only by the primer set reported by Itagaki et al. (10).

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Saffold Cardioviruses in Children with Diarrhea | CDC EID


Suggested Citation for this Article
Khamrin P, Chaimongkol N, Nantachit N, Okitsu S, Ushijima H, Maneekarn N. Saffold cardioviruses in children with diarrhea, Thailand [letter]. Emerg Infect Dis [serial on the Internet]. 2011 Jun [date cited]. http://www.cdc.gov/EID/content/17/6/1150.htm

DOI: 10.3201/eid1706.101983


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Niwat Maneekarn, Department of Microbiology, Faculty of Medicine, Chiang Mai University, Chiang Mai 50200, Thailand; email: nmaneeka@med.cmu.ac.th