Coronaviruses In Children, Greece

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Journal Title, Volume, Page: 
Emerging Infectious Dis, Volume 13, 13(6): 947–949, June 2007
Year of Publication: 
2007
Authors: 
Anna Papa
Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Thessaloniki, Greece
Evangelia Papadimitriou
Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Thessaloniki, Greece
Luciano Kleber de Souza Luna
Berhard Nocht Institute for Tropical Medicine, Hamburg, Germany
Motassim Al Masri
Department of Biological Sciences, An-Najah N. University, Nablus, Palestine
Efimia Souliou
Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Thessaloniki, Greece
Maria Eboriadou
University General AHEPA Hospital, Thessaloniki, Greece
Antonis Antoniadis
Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Thessaloniki, Greece
Christian Drosten
Berhard Nocht Institute for Tropical Medicine, Hamburg, Germany
Preferred Abstract (Original): 

Two recently detected human coronaviruses (HCoVs), NL63 and HKU1, increased the number of coronaviruses known to infect humans to 5 (1–3). HCoV-229E and HCoV-NL63 belong to antigenic group 1, HCoV-OC43 and HCoV-HKU1 belong to antigenic group 2, and severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS)–associated coronavirus (SARS-CoV) is most closely related to group 2 coronaviruses. In 2005, an optimized pancoronavirus reverse transcription–PCR assay was used to explore the incidence of HCoV-NL63 infection in children in Belgium who had a diagnosis of respiratory tract infection (4). We report the results of an epidemiologic study that used a universal coronavirus RT-PCR assay to detect coronaviruses among children in Greece with acute respiratory tract infections.  We tested throat swab specimens obtained from children hospitalized in Greece during June 2003 through May 2004 (200 children 2 months to 14 years of age, mean 4.09 years) and during December 2005 through March 2006 (44 children 1.6–8.5 years of age, mean 5.05). Specimens were obtained the first day of each child's hospitalization, and all specimens were included in the study, regardless whether other respiratory microorganisms were detected.

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