Why the study?
Hepacivirus species have a broad host range, but none except hepatitis C virus is known to be highly pathogenic to its host.
This study identifies the first known highly pathogenic animal hepacivirus, which causes severe acute hepatitis in hoary bamboo rats.
New hepacivirus linked to rat hepatitis; leaves open zoonotic risk and human surveillance needs.
Members of the genus Hepacivirus have a broad host range, with at least 14 species identified, but none is highly pathogenic to its host except for hepatitis C virus, which causes severe liver diseases in humans. In this study, a new liver-tropic hepacivirus species was identified by high-throughput sequencing as the pathogen associated with two outbreaks of severely acute hepatitis in hoary bamboo rats ( Rhizomys pruinosus ) on two farms in Hainan Province, China; this is the first reported highly pathogenic animal hepacivirus to our knowledge.
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Jiang et al. (2022) studied this question.
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