Virological Features and Clinical Manifestations Associated with Human Metapneumovirus: A New Paramyxovirus Responsible for Acute Respiratory-Tract Infections in All Age Groups

• Published in: The Journal of infectious diseases Vol. 186; no. 9; pp. 1330 - 1334
• Main Authors: Boivin, Guy, Abed, Yacine, Pelletier, Gilles, Ruel, Louisette, Moisan, Danielle, Côté, Stéphanie, Peret, Teresa C. T., Erdman, Dean D., Anderson, Larry J.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Chicago, IL The University of Chicago Press 01.11.2002; University of Chicago Press; Oxford University Press
• Subjects: Acute Disease; Age Distribution; Animals; Biological and medical sciences; Cell Line; Cell lines; Cercopithecus aethiops; Concise Communications; DNA Primers; Epidemiology; Human respiratory syncytial virus; Human viral diseases; Humans; Infections; Infectious diseases; Medical sciences; Metapneumovirus; Metapneumovirus - classification; Metapneumovirus - genetics; Metapneumovirus - pathogenicity; Older adults; Paramyxoviridae Infections - physiopathology; Paramyxoviridae Infections - virology; Pathogens; Phylogeny; Pneumology; Pneumonia; Respiratory system : syndromes and miscellaneous diseases; Respiratory Tract Infections - virology; Reverse Transcriptase Polymerase Chain Reaction; Viral diseases; Viral diseases of the respiratory system and ent viral diseases; Virology; Viruses; Canada; North America; America; Human; Lung disease; Pneumovirinae; Respiratory disease; Virological exploration; Age criterion; Clinical form; Epidemiology; Retrospective; Paramyxoviridae; Bronchiolitis; Virus; Infection; Mononegavirales; Immunosuppression; Viral disease; Pneumovirus; Pneumopathy
• ISSN: 0022-1899; 1537-6613
• DOI: 10.1086/344319

The virological features and clinical findings associated with the new human metapneumovirus (HMPV) were examined retrospectively in Canadian patients hospitalized for various respiratory conditions since 1993. Thirty-eight previously unidentified respiratory viruses isolated from rhesus monkey kindey (LLC-MK2) cells were found to be positive for HMPV by reverse-transcription polymerase chain reaction, and those strains clustered in 2 phylogenetic groups. Children aged <5 years and elderly subjects aged >65 years represented 35.1% and 45.9% of the HMPV-infected cases, respectively. In hospitalized children, the most frequent diagnoses were pneumonitis (66.7%) and bronchiolitis (58.3%), whereas bronchitis and/or bronchospasm (60%) and pneumonitis (40%) were most commonly seen in elderly subjects. Of the 15 patients with pneumonitis, 4 (26.7%) had immunosuppressive conditions and 6 (40%) were infants aged <15 months. These findings suggest that HMPV can be associated with severe lower-respiratory-tract infections in very young children, the elderly, and immunocompromised patients