CSIR to help crack east UP virus

In 2008,NIV’s Gorakhpur unit had found that certain entero-viruses which enter the body through oral-faecal route,are the culprits behind the mysterious Acute Encephalitis Syndrome (AES) prevalent among children in eastern UP. The Atlanta-based Center for Disease Control had also corroborated the finding. Since then,the NIV laboratory has been working to identify the precise nature of these viruses without success.

“Thousands of entero-viruses are present in the atmosphere. Attempts have been made to isolate some of the viruses found in eastern UP but it is a cumbersome and time-consuming process. So it has been decided to take help from IGIB for a systematic study,” said a senior officer of the Union Health Ministry.

He added,“IGIB has the infrastructure to do High-throughput Screening (HTS),which is a rapid method. It has the capacity also to do a large number of tests at a time and with high accuracy. Their infrastructure is comparable with that of laboratories in developed countries and we hope to move ahead in the direction of identifying the viruses with their assistance.”

Every year,Japanese Encephalitis and AES kill hundreds of children in eastern UP between August and October,but AES is the main killer. Since the symptoms of the two diseases are similar,all are initially recorded as AES cases. After testing,JE cases are recorded separately.

Dr KP Kushwaha,head of Department of Pediatrics at Gorakhpur’s BRD Medical College,said,“The number of JE cases was slightly higher last year,but the pattern of the disease is almost the same for past few years. The number of unidentified AES cases is over 74 per cent. We hope the IGIB with its state-of-art equipment would be able to isolate the virus quickly.”

Last year,about 3500 AES cases were registered in eastern UP with over 500 deaths.