EV viruses and isolation of SLE, EE, group C and Group Guamá arboviruses in the Amazon region of Perú in 1975
Scherer, W.F.; Madalengoitia, J.; Meneses, O.; Acosta, M.
Boletin de la Oficina Sanitaria Panamericana. Pan American Sanitary Bureau 89(1): 1-15
1980
ISSN/ISBN: 0030-0632 PMID: 6255963 Document Number: 154555
Venezuelan encephalitis virus (VE) was present in the Amazon region of Peru during 1975. The virus was isolated near Iquitos (Loreto Department) in eastern Peru: antibody evidence of recent infection without epidemics or equine epizootics was found further west at Yurimaguas (Loreto Department) in lowlands near the Andes Mountains. These observations are consistent with the theory that VE virus is silently enzootic in the Peruvian Amazon Basin, and that this region has served as a source of virus for the periodic outbreaks of human and equine disease that have occurred in irrigated, inhabited locations on the dry Pacific Coast. Historically, and most recently in 1973, the majority of these coastal epidemics and equine epizootics have taken place along Peru's northern coast, but in areas that (except in 1969) were not contiguous with Ecuador, where VE virus also causes disease. This fact fits in with the theory that VE virus may have traditionally moved through low mountain passes, which are limited in Peru, to the northern portion of the Andes Mountains. Now, airplanes could also move viremic people or infected mosquitoes across the mountains. Other mosquito-borne viruses, including St. Louis encephalitis (a flavivirus), eastern encephalitis (an alphavirus), and a group C bunyavirus were also isolated during 1975 near Yurimaguas; 2 Guama group bunyaviruses were isolated near Iquitos in Peru's Amazon lowlands.