www.pubmed.com article about norwalk

[japa]

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Hello,


Well, I just posted the first couple of sentences to this article from a medical journal. I just did it because the second sentence was intriguing to me. It says basically that doctors/scientists developed diagnostic techniques that are able to identify that a virus is a norovirus and that it has led to increased "recognition" of stomach illnesses as being caused by these.


The article is from 2004, not too long ago. So, the reason I decided to put it here is because I think it relates to our frequent discussions of feeling that stomach viruses are so much more prevalent "now" (whenever that is) than in "the past" (whenever exactly that is). Sometime prior to 2004, identification of norovirus became more possible for scientists. Sometime around 2002, I remember hearing a whole heck of a lot on the news about Norwalk virus, and I've heard about it ever since. Doesn't the fact that stomach virus outbreaks now have a name like this attached and the fact that they know so much more about these viruses than they did in say, 1970 contribute to our hearing more about them? That thus in turn could contribute to our believing that they are so much more prevalent and more threatening.


I don't know. It's just a thought.











Trends Microbiol. 2004 Jun;12(6):279-87.</TD>
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Norovirus disease: changing epidemiology and host susceptibility factors.

Hutson AM, Atmar RL, Estes MK.

Department of Molecular Virology &amp; Microbiology, Baylor College of Medicine, One Baylor Plaza BCM-385, Houston, TX 77030, USA.

Noroviruses cause the majority of acute viral gastroenteritis cases that occur worldwide. The increased recognition of noroviruses as the cause of outbreaks and sporadic disease is due to the recent availability of improved norovirus-specific diagnostics. </DD>Edited by: japa

[californiagirl]

Do I sense a VACCINE soon??? Hopefully??? That would be WONDERFUL!!!!!

[shiva]

A vaccine would be great. I would get one.

[japa]

A while back when I first joined up on here, I posted about a study on Norwalk that wasadvertised on a flyerat the shuttle bus stop at my school. It was requesting healthy volunteers of certain ages to be infected with Norwalk, and it had warnings about getting sick. I think that you had to stay inpatient somewhere for a bit, but you got paid.


I live in Houston where a lot of medical studies go on. Last year, some medical group kept mailing me a flyer about participating in a herpes vaccine study. You had to be not infected, and you had to be a certain age. I was infection-free, but I was a year too old. I wouldn't have participated anyway. That would freak me out. [img]smileys/smilies_03.gif[/img]

[PhilB]

I agree that Norovirus is NOT more prevalent than before. My sister who has been a nurse for close to 20 years now said that every year, like clock work, it comes back. There's a anotehr article that says that a new strain has emerged in 2003 which *could* account for more infections.... Speculation?truth? who really knows?

As far as vaccine, I've been following this for a couple of years now and it gives me hope that a vaccine may be possible.

There's a company called ligocyte that is in pre-clinical trial phase for a vaccine
http://www.ligocyte.com/products/pipeline.aspx

And the other is an article saying that they can grow the virus in lab making it possible to come up with a vaccine.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/4052291.stm

[dayna1x]

A vaccine, that would give me such relief! We really need that!