Investigators found that simultaneous infection with adeno-associated virus type 2 and certain other viruses is associated with the outbreak of mysterious pediatric hepatitis cases worldwide. MedTwitter
More than 1000 children worldwide had been diagnosed with unexplained acute pediatric hepatitis as of August 2022. In the United States, there have been 358 cases, including 22 in which the child required a liver transplant and 13 in which the child died.
They assessed samples using multiple technologies, including metagenomic sequencing, tiling multiplex polymerase chain reaction amplicon sequencing, metagenomic sequencing with probe capture viral enrichment, and virus-specific PCR. Many of these advanced techniques were not even available 5-10 years ago, Chiu said.Blood samples were available for 14 of the 16 children with acute hepatitis of unknown origin. Among this study group, AAV2 was found in 13 .
Analysis of whole blood revealed enterovirus A71 in one patient. HAdV type C also was detected in one child on the basis of a nasopharyngeal swab, and picobirnavirus was found in a stool sample from another patient.