Arboviral Diseases Branch, Division of Vector-Borne Diseases, National Center for Zoonotic and Emerging Infectious Diseases, U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 3156 Rampart Road, Fort Collins, CO 80521, USA.
Viruses. 2013 Dec 10;5(12):3088-108. doi: 10.3390/v5123088.
Prior to 1999, West Nile virus (WNV) was a bit player in the screenplay of global vector-borne viral diseases. First discovered in the West Nile District of Uganda in 1937, this Culex sp.-transmitted virus was known for causing small human febrile outbreaks in Africa and the Middle East. Prior to 1995, the last major human WNV outbreak was in the 1950s in Israel. The epidemiology and ecology of WNV began to change in the mid-1990s when an epidemic of human encephalitis occurred in Romania. The introduction of WNV into Eastern Europe was readily explained by bird migration between Africa and Europe. The movement of WNV from Africa to Europe could not, however, predict its surprising jump across the Atlantic Ocean to New York City and the surrounding areas of the United States (U.S.). This movement of WNV from the Eastern to Western Hemisphere in 1999, and its subsequent dissemination throughout two continents in less than ten years is widely recognized as one of the most significant events in arbovirology during the last two centuries. This paper documents the early events of the introduction into and the spread of WNV in the Western Hemisphere.
在 1999 年之前，西尼罗河病毒（WNV）在全球虫媒病毒疾病的剧本中只是一个小角色。该病毒于 1937 年首次在乌干达的西尼罗河地区发现，以前已知会在非洲和中东地区引起人类小范围发热爆发。在 1995 年之前，WNV 上一次大规模的人类爆发是在 20 世纪 50 年代的以色列。WNV 的流行病学和生态学在 90 年代中期发生了变化，当时罗马尼亚发生了人类脑炎流行。WNV 传入东欧可以很容易地通过非洲和欧洲之间的鸟类迁徙来解释。然而，WNV 从非洲到欧洲的移动并不能预测其令人惊讶的跨越大西洋到达纽约市和美国（美国）周边地区。WNV 于 1999 年从东半球到西半球的移动，以及随后在不到十年的时间内在两个大陆的传播，被广泛认为是过去两个世纪虫媒病毒学中最重要的事件之一。本文记录了 WNV 在西半球的传入和传播的早期事件。
