Open AccessSindbis Virus Strains of Divergent Origin Isolated from Humans and Mosquitoes During a Recent Outbreak in Finland
Author(s) -
Essi M. Korhonen,
Maija T. Suvanto,
Ruut Uusitalo,
Giulia Faolotto,
Teemu Smura,
Jussi Sane,
Olli Vapalahti,
Eili Huhtamo
Publication year - 2020
Publication title -
vector borne and zoonotic diseases
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.839
H-Index - 73
eISSN - 1557-7759
pISSN - 1530-3667
DOI - 10.1089/vbz.2019.2562
Subject(s) - sindbis virus , biology , outbreak , virology , virus , alphavirus , genotype , arbovirus , transmission (telecommunications) , alphavirus infection , strain (injury) , zoology , genetics , gene , anatomy , electrical engineering , engineering , rna
Sindbis virus (SINV) is a mosquito-borne avian hosted virus that is widely distributed in Europe, Africa, Asia, and Oceania. Disease in humans is documented mainly from Northern Europe and South Africa and associated with genotype I. In 2018 under extremely warm climatic conditions, a small outbreak of 71 diagnosed SINV infections was recorded in Finland. We screened 52 mosquito pools (570 mosquitoes) and 223 human sera for SINV with real-time RT-PCR and the positive samples with virus isolation. One SINV strain was isolated from a pool ( n = 13) of genus Ochlerotatus mosquitoes and three strains from patient serum samples. Complete genome analysis suggested all the isolates to be divergent from one another and related to previous Finnish, Swedish, and German strains. The study provides evidence of SINV strain transfer within Europe across regions with different epidemiological characteristics. Whether these are influenced by different mosquito genera involved in the transmission remains to be studied.