Nine children's neurological symptoms of limb weakness and paralysis could be connected to the recent mystery outbreak of the respiratory disease Enterovirus 68, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported. Confirmed to have afflicted 10 states in the U.S., the unusual virus has sickened more than 277 people, mostly children, the Washington Post reported.
Between Aug. 8 and Sept. 17, nine children in Denver were identified as having a kind of respiratory virus before showing symptoms of limb weakness and paralysis, ABC News reported. While six have tested positive for Enterovirus 68, which causes severe breathing problems particularly in children with pre-existing asthma or respiratory problems, two other cases are yet to be confirmed, Colorado health officials said.
According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the rare respiratory virus is related to the rhinovirus, which causes cold-like symptoms.
Specifically, children between the ages from 1 to 18, with an average age of 10, have been affected, said Dr. Larry Wolk, the chief medical officer and executive director for Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment, adding that their symptoms are not related to polio, which is caused by a viral infection that leads to paralysis.
"It is a spectrum of arm or leg weakness that can be as mild weakness or as severe as paralysis," Wolk said. "What ties them all together though are findings of spots or lesions in the gray matter of the spinal cord on MRI scans."
"This is a very small number of patients," Wolk told the Denver Post. However, he said parents should be aware but not panicked by the findings.
"It's a pretty rare complication and not unexpected with this kind of viruses," Wolk said. "You hear about this nine with this complication, what you're not hearing about is that thousands or hundreds of thousands" just have a cold.
Dr. William Schaffner, an infectious disease expert at the Vanderbilt University School of Medicine, said he found the report "sobering" but that more research needs to be done to discover the cause, according to ABC News.
"From time to time other Enteroviruses can behave very sporadically like the polio virus," Schaffner said. "The leading candidate is indeed this Enterovirus D-68. Having said that ... further investigations are going on with the children."
Meanwhile, medical workers nationwide have been asked to be attentive for similar symptoms and immediately report them, the CDC said, who is investigating the cases.
First discovered in 1960s, enteroviruses are common and usually do not require hospital care. But the past month has witnessed an unusually high number of cases where the cold-like symptoms have developed into acute respiratory distress, eventually hospitalizing patients, and in some cases, placing them in intensive care, BBC News reported.
Since the illness spreads through close contact with infected people, the CDC recommends basic sanitary practices to avoid spreading the virus and reducing the risk of infection, including frequent hand washing, avoiding those who are sick, and covering the nose and mouth during sneezes or coughs.
