Key Laboratory of Northwest Water Resource, Ecology and Environment, Ministry of Education, Xi'an University of Architecture and Technolog, Xi'an, Shaanxi 710055, China.
Microbes Environ. 2012;27(3):288-92. doi: 10.1264/jsme2.me11352. Epub 2012 Mar 23.
Hand, foot and mouth disease (HFMD), caused by a group of enteric viruses such as Enterovirus 71 (EV71), Coxsackievirus A16 (CVA16) and Coxsackievirus A10 (CVA10), is heavily epidemic in East Asia. This research focused on investigating the occurrence of HFMD pathogens in domestic sewage and secondary effluent before disinfection in a wastewater treatment plant (WWTP) in Xi'an, the largest megacity in northwest China. In order to simultaneously detect all three HFMD pathogens, a semi-nested RT-PCR assay was constructed with a newly designed primer set targeting conservative gene regions from the 5' untranslated region (UTR) to VP2. As a result, 86% of raw sewage samples and 29% of the secondary effluent samples were positive for the HFMD viral gene, indicating that HFMD pathogens were highly prevalent in domestic wastewater and that they could also persist, even with lower probability, in the secondary effluent before disinfection. Of the three HFMD pathogens, CVA10 was positive in 48% of the total samples, while the occurrences of CVA16 and EV71 were 12% and 2%, respectively. It could thus be stated that CVA10 is the main HFMD pathogen prevailing in the study area, at least during the investigation period. High genetic diversity in the conservative gene region among the same serotype of the HFMD pathogen was identified by phylogenetic analysis, implying that this HFMD pathogen replicates frequently among the population excreting the domestic sewage.
手足口病（HFMD）是由一组肠道病毒引起的，如肠道病毒 71 型（EV71）、柯萨奇病毒 A16 型（CVA16）和柯萨奇病毒 A10 型（CVA10），在东亚地区流行严重。本研究集中于调查中国西北部最大的特大城市西安的一家污水处理厂（WWTP）中，在未经消毒的生活污水和二级出水中 HFMD 病原体的发生情况。为了同时检测所有三种 HFMD 病原体，我们使用新设计的引物组构建了半巢式 RT-PCR 检测方法，针对 5'非翻译区（UTR）到 VP2 的保守基因区域。结果显示，86%的原污水样本和 29%的二级出水样本中 HFMD 病毒基因呈阳性，表明 HFMD 病原体在生活污水中高度流行，即使在二级出水中经过消毒，也能以较低的概率持续存在。在三种 HFMD 病原体中，CVA10 在总样本中阳性率为 48%，而 CVA16 和 EV71 的发生率分别为 12%和 2%。因此，可以说 CVA10 是该研究地区流行的主要 HFMD 病原体，至少在调查期间是如此。HFMD 病原体同一血清型保守基因区域的高遗传多样性通过系统进化分析得到证实，这意味着该 HFMD 病原体在排泄生活污水的人群中频繁复制。
