Here we go again. France has confirmed the first human case of Shamonda virus in history, an animal virus scientists believed could not infect people at all. The patient, who was being treated at a hospital in Lyon, died in early October. French health officials announced the case on Thursday, October 22.
Until now, the Shamonda virus was something farmers worried about, not doctors. It mainly infects cattle, and in those animals it causes fever, diarrhea and a drop in milk production. It has also turned up in horses, sheep, goats and alpacas, according to the World Organisation for Animal Health.
French officials said the patient had a severely weakened immune system and was infected earlier this year. In a statement, the country’s health ministries called it “an exceptional case involving a severely immunocompromised patient.” Immunocompromised means the body’s defenses against infection are much weaker than normal, which can happen during cancer treatment, after an organ transplant or with certain illnesses. People in that condition can get sick from germs that would never harm a healthy person.
What officials still do not know is whether the Shamonda virus actually killed the patient. The European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control, the European Union’s public health agency, said investigations are ongoing into whether the virus caused or contributed to the death, and into how the patient became infected in the first place. French authorities said doctors and experts in human, animal and environmental health are working the case together.
Shamonda spreads through biting midges, tiny flying insects even smaller than mosquitoes that many people know as no see ums. A midge bites an infected animal, picks up the virus and passes it along with its next bite. That is how it moves through herds. Officials have not said how this patient was exposed.
The virus is not new. Scientists first identified the Shamonda virus in Nigeria in the 1960s, and over the decades it has appeared in cattle across West, East and southern Africa and in Japan. In all that time, no human case was ever documented, according to the French health ministry.
What is new is where it is showing up. Shamonda reached Europe for the first time this summer. In late July, genetic testing on sick cattle in southern Germany, Switzerland and eastern France confirmed the virus. Since then, France’s weekly animal health surveillance report has listed detections in Austria, Belgium, Ireland, Italy, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Portugal, Slovenia, Spain and the island of Jersey.
The Shamonda virus is a close cousin of Schmallenberg virus, which appeared in Germany in 2011 and spread through European livestock. Research on Schmallenberg did not find it to be a danger to people, and most viruses in this family do not jump from animals to humans. The French case is the first time this one has.
For now, health officials are urging calm. The ECDC said it is carefully monitoring the situation and that “no health risk to the general population has been identified to date.” French authorities delivered the same message, stressing there is no risk to the public at this stage.
