An outbreak caused by hantavirus in the Black Sea region of Turkey, January – May 2009

An outbreak caused by hantavirus in the Black Sea region of Turkey, January – May 2009
M Ertek on behalf of the Refik Saydam National Public Health Agency, T Buzgan on behalf of the Ministry of Health

EUROSURVEILLANCE Vol . 14 · Issue 20 · 21 May 2009

Between 22 January and 1 May 2009, a total of 25 suspected cases of HFRS were reported. Blood samples were taken from 23 patients and tested for hantaviruses. The remaining two patients had died before sampling, so they are considered as suspected cases. We confirmed that 12 out of 23 samples (52.2%) were positive for hantavirus in IFA and immunoblot. However, no positive result was found in the plasma/serum (n=14) and/or urine samples (n=6) by RT-PCR method.

The epidemic curve is shown in Figure 2. The mean age of laboratory-confirmed patients was 56 years (range 22-78), the male to female ratio was 6:1 All 25 suspected cases were admitted to hospital. The fatality rate among these hospitalised patients was 8%.