Graham Lloyd

Viral haemorrhagic fever in southern Sudan and northern Zaire. Preliminary studies on the aetiological agent.

A method and an apparatus for producing openings in sheet metal material being provided in band form as well as a perforated sheet material produced by said method. The method comprises providing notches in the sheet material and stretching partial areas of the notched sheet material by a thickness-reducing processing step, whereby the notches which lie between the stretched partial areas of the notched sheet material are enlarged to form openings. The apparatus for producing openings in sheet metal material comprises roller means for producing notches in the sheet material and roller means for stretching partial areas of the notched sheet material by thickness reduction. The resulting perforated sheet metal material combines the advantages of punched sheet metal, i.e., mechanical stability, and expanded metal mesh, i.e., no loss of material during production of the openings in the sheet material.

Dengue Hemorrhagic Fever with Fulminant Hepatic Failure in an Immigrant Returning to Bangladesh

An immigrant from Bangladesh living in the United Kingdom presented with a nonspecific febrile illness after visiting his homeland and subsequently developed fulminant hepatic failure accompanied by hypotension, ascites, a generalized coagulopathy, and thrombocytopenia. Serology and detection of dengue virus serotype 3 by PCR established a postmortem diagnosis of hepatic failure secondary to dengue hemorrhagic fever.

Q Fever Outbreak in Industrial Setting

An outbreak of Q fever was likely caused by renovation work that aerosolized contaminated straw board.

Chronic Q Fever: Different Serological Results in 3 Countries—Results of a Follow-up Study 6 Years After a Point Source Outbreak

BACKGROUND Acute and chronic Q fever/Coxiella burnetii infection is diagnosed principally by serology. The management of patients who have serological evidence of chronic Q fever but no other manifestation of chronic infection is challenging. METHODS This paper describes a follow-up study of individuals 6 years after a point source outbreak. The study compares serological and polymerase chain reaction (PCR) results between 3 international reference laboratories in a well-defined cohort of Q fever patients. RESULTS Concordance in microimmunofluorescence result interpretation from the 3 centers was only 35%. Australian and UK results had the greatest concordance and French and UK results the lowest. Serological testing revealed no chronic serological profiles when tested in either France or Australia but 10 when tested in the UK. Serological results from a patient with treated Q fever endocarditis suggested treated (France), chronic (UK), and borderline chronic (Australia) infection. PCR results on blood were universally negative. CONCLUSIONS This study has shown that the results from Q fever micro-immunofluorescence vary according to the center in which they are carried out. This has implications for the interpretation of such tests, raises questions regarding the validity of using serological criteria alone as a means of diagnosing chronic Q fever, and affects the interpretation of epidemiological studies. We recommend that all results are interpreted according to the clinical picture and particular caution is applied in the interpretation of chronic serological profiles. In order to further our understanding of Q fever infection we propose that an international standard of Q fever serological investigation be developed.

Mopeia virus-related arenavirus in natal multimammate mice, Morogoro, Tanzania

A serosurvey involving 2,520 small mammals from Tanzania identified a hot spot of arenavirus circulation in Morogoro. Molecular screening detected a new arenavirus in Natal multimammate mice (Mastomys natalensis), Morogoro virus, related to Mopeia virus. Only a small percentage of mice carry Morogoro virus, although a large proportion shows specific antibodies.

Expression of the Lassa virus nucleocapsid protein in insect cells infected with a recombinant baculovirus: application to diagnostic assays for Lassa virus infection.

The coding region of the gene for the nucleocapsid protein of Lassa virus has been inserted into the genome of Autographa californica nuclear polyhedrosis virus (AcNPV) using the transfer vector pAcYM1, so that expression of the foreign DNA is under the control of the promoter of the AcNPV polyhedrin gene. Infection of cultured Spodoptera frugiperda cells with recombinant virus resulted in the synthesis of high levels of a protein that was indistinguishable from the authentic Lassa virus protein by SDS gel electrophoresis and immunoblotting with a variety of specific immune sera and monoclonal antibodies (MAbs). The kinetics of appearance of the protein were comparable to those of polyhedrin production in wild-type AcNPV-infected cells. The recombinant material was antigenic when used in ELISA for Lassa virus-specific antibodies, reacting well with MAbs specific for the nucleocapsid protein and with sera from experimentally infected guinea-pigs. The recombinant ELISA was able to clearly distinguish sera from human cases of Lassa fever against a panel of known negative sera of African origin. Recombinant-infected insect cells were an effective substitute for mammalian cells infected with Lassa virus itself in the immunofluorescence assay for Lassa virus-specific antibodies. This system offers attractive alternatives to the use of Lassa virus-infected materials as reagents in diagnostic procedures.

How long has the AIDS virus been in Uganda

In a study conducted in the 1970s, 66.7% of healthy Ugandan children living in the West Nile district tested positive for HIV infection by direct ELISA assay. But such assays frequently yield false-positive results when sera are tested from areas where parasitic infestation is common. This study attempts to determine how long the AIDS virus has been present among the Ugandan population through a re-examination of sera from the West Nile district and an examination of the sera of old people from the Kampala area. A competitive ELISA assay was used which does not have many of the drawbacks associated with direct ELISA assays. Of 71 healthy adults tested in the West Nile district, 1 tested positive for HIV infection. 15% of healthy adults in Kampala tested positive. Of 96 old people in Kampala, all of whom for various reasons were thought to have been sexually inactive for the past 5 years, none tested positive for HIV infection. The indications of this study are that AIDS is not endemic in the West Nile, and the disease is a recent arrival to Uganda. Previous suggestions that the disease originated in Uganda are incorrect.

Congo/Crimean haemorrhagic fever virus from Iraq 1979: I. Morphology in BHK21 cells.

SummaryCongo-Crimean Haemorrhagic Fever virus, isolated from a patient in Iraq, was grown, after passage in suckling mouse brain, in BHK cells. The particles matured after 8–9 days in these cells by budding, usually singly, into cytoplasmic vacuoles throughout the host cells. The virions had an overall diameter of 115 to 125 nm, including rounded surface spikes 15 nm long and 10 nm wide. The viral cores, surrounded by a lipid unit membrane, contained discrete electron-dense elements. It is suggested that the spikes, dimpled at their outer end and possibly hollow throughout their length, passed out through “pores” in the unit membrane.

EFFECT OF BILE SALTS AND OF FUSIDIC ACID ON HIV-1 INFECTION OF CULTURED CELLS

Bile salts completely inactivated human immunodeficiency virus type 1 (HIV-1) in vitro and, unexpectedly, completely destroyed all the cultured persistently HIV-1 infected T cells. Fusidic acid, which likewise possesses the properties of an anionic surfactant, inactivated HIV-1 only at concentrations toxic to uninfected cultured cells. Bile salts or their derivatives, and other anionic surfactants, could be of therapeutic value in HIV-1 infections.

The European network of Biosafety-Level-4 laboratories: enhancing European preparedness for new health threats

Abstract Emerging and re-emerging infections and possible bioterrorism acts will continue to challenge both the medical community and civilian populations worldwide, urging health authorities to respond rapidly and effectively. Established in 2005, the European Community (EC)-funded European Network of Biosafety-Level-4 laboratories (Euronet-P4), which brings together the laboratories in Porton Down, London, Hamburg, Marburg, Solna, Lyon and Rome, seeks to increase international collaboration in the areas of high containment laboratory biosafety and viral diagnostic capability, to strengthen Europes capacity to respond to an infectious disease emergency, and to offer assistance to countries not equipped with such costly facilities. Network partners have agreed on a common strategy to fill the gaps identified in the field of risk group-4 agents’ laboratory diagnosis, namely the lack of standardization and of reference samples. The network has received a further 3-year funding, to offer assistance to external laboratories, and to start the planning of field activities.