A 9-year-old boy (remember, children and elderly are the most susceptible) had a fever (39 C/104 F) for 4 days, sore throat, headache, muscle ache, pronounced fatigue, and nausea lasting about 6 days, with recovery after 13 days. A 9-year-old girl had a fever [up to] 104 F for 3 days, sore throat, headache, muscle ache, pronounced fatigue, nausea, vomiting, maculopapular rash (inflamed bumps, blotchy) including flushed face, and slightly enlarged lymph nodes. The illness lasted about 7 days, with complete recovery after 17 days. Of other wnv patients, one had severe headache, muscle ache, prolonged fatigue, nausea, pain in eye movement, maculopapular rash, and insomnia.
Thoes are the first documented human casesof wnv in Central Europe; and extensive (and famous) outbreak occured in Romania in 1996 - about 500 patients were hospitalized >>Fatality rate: 4%-8%
Mosquito-borne viruses in Western Europe-
In W. Europe, several mosquito-borne arboviruses belonging to the genera Alphavirus, Flavivirus, and Bunyavirus have been reported to occur in mosquitoes and to infect humans, as well as other vertebrates in Western Europe. West Nile Virus caused an outbreak of fever, malaise, pain in the eyes and muscles, a headache and encephalitis in southern France (1962-1965). WNV has been isolated from birds, horses, and mosquitos in Portugal, France, former Czechoslovakia, and Romania (it is a most popular disease : ). Along with reports of antibodies to wnv in birds, domestic mammals, and humans in several other countries show that there is virus activity in Central and lower Europe.
Russia-
July-September 1999, a widespread outbreak of meningoencephalitis associated with wnv occurred in southern Russia, with hundreds of cases and dozens of deaths. Two strains of wnv were isolated. Both reacted in hemagglutination inhibition and neutralization tests with patients' convalescent-phase sera and immune ascites (serous abdominal fluid) fluid from other strains of West Nile.
India-
WNV is prevalent in the pig population in and around Chandigrah.
This is basically an excerpt, rewritten slightly (Institut Pasteur, Dakar, Senegal. J Gen Virol 1997):
The sequence of a protein gene fragment from 21 temporally distinct West Nile (WN) virus strains, isolated in nine African countries and in France were compared. Alignment of nucleotide sequences defined two groups of viruses which diverged by up to 29%. The first group of subtypes is composed of nine WN strains from France and Africa. (The Austral-Asian Kunjin virus was classified as a WN subtype in this first group.) The second group includes 12 WN strains from Africa and Madagascar. Four strains harbored a 12 nucleotide in-frame deletion. The isolation of closely related subtypes in distant countries is consistent with WN viruses being disseminated by migrating birds.
What's interesting:
When the first identified strain of West Nile fever was introduced to North America, it took quite a toll (7 deaths & 62 cases of encephalitis), and gave the media something somewhat interesting to munch on. The disease wasn't identified immediately because of the lack of adequate laboratory facilities, and also the fact that there are a lot of similar diseases that aren't easily distinguishable immediately. It was new to the US, so it was misidentified as St. Louis Encephalitis. The symptoms of encephalitis cases are the same in general, so in that respect the misidentification is understandable. In other countries, the symptoms are about the same, but more common. That side of the ocean has had West Nile for about 20 years. Anyway, a few months after wnv hit America, the human hubbub seemed to die down. My guess is that the strain evolved, mutated, or at least changed in some way to make it less harmful. But what's interesting is that it remains quite harmful to birds still, and was, apparently, frighteningly virulent to the native US birds, and birds are still dying up and down the East Coast.
important but somewhat incomplete bibliography >>>
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