European, international and national public health authorities have been working closely together since the identification of two cases with a novel coronavirus became known. One case has died in Saudi Arabia and the second is in intensive care in a London hospital.
A novel coronavirus has been identified with laboratory tests in two patients both with severe respiratory and renal disease. Coronaviruses are a group of viruses causing respiratory infections in humans and animals.
Since July 2011, 155 cases of the variant influenza A(H3N2) virus (A(H3N2)v) have been detected in the US: Hawaii (1), Indiana (113), Iowa (3), Maine (2), Ohio (30), Pennsylvania (3), Utah (1), and West Virginia (2). Most cases reported in Indiana and Ohio are recent cases. No human to human transmission has been determined among these recent cases.
A report in the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) MMWR this week describes the investigation of mild respiratory illness among swine and people at a county fair in Indiana, USA between 8 and 14 July 2012. This is an important report as it is very clearly documents simultaneous detection of H3N2v influenza viruses in humans and swine in close contact.
This report describes the investigation of two cases of febrile respiratory illness caused by swine influenza A (H3N2) viruses identified on the 19th and the 26th August 2011 in two different states in the US (Indiana and Pennsylvania).