Don't stir up the dust in rat-infested areas

Hantavirus suspected in death
By David Benda

Saturday, August 14, 2010

Mono County health officials believe a 61-year-old Redding man who was working as a seasonal park employee in Bodie died late last week from hantavirus, a rare disease carried by rodents.

Richard Laird Johnson died Thursday afternoon at a Reno hospital after suffering from flu-like symptoms for four days.


http://www.redding.com/news/2010/aug/14/hantavirus-suspected-in-death/

=====================================================



Chronic Fatigue Linked to Mouse Virus in U.S. Government Study

Bloomberg August 23, 2010 04:00 AM

Aug. 23 (Bloomberg) -- Almost 90 percent of patients with chronic fatigue syndrome showed signs of infection with a novel mouse virus in a U.S. government study, raising fresh questions about the cause and treatment of the debilitating condition.

Researchers from the Food and Drug Administration, the National Institutes of Health, and Harvard Medical School found the virus in blood samples taken from 32 of 37 patients with the syndrome, bolstering a finding with a related virus last year. The new infectious agent was also found in three of 44 samples from healthy blood donors, according to the study published today in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

It was the first time the mouse virus has been found in people or in the blood supply, deepening the mystery surrounding CFS, a condition that affects more than 1 million Americans, mainly women ages 30 to 50. A report from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention had said there was no sign of the virus in a similar study earlier this year. Those results were confirmed by the current FDA researchers, who analyzed some the CDC's samples using their own laboratory methods.

"The study doesn't prove these viruses are the cause of chronic fatigue syndrome," said Celia Witten, director of the FDA's Office of Cellular, Tissue and Gene Therapies, who oversees the lab where the research was conducted. "More research is needed."


http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/g/a/2010/08/23/bloomberg1376-L7MAWR1A1I4I01-5039MPFIQ0JNB25JE2DJV2JJS6.DTL