As bundles of severe echovirus infections pop up in at least three countries, U.S. infectious diseases experts are seeing a small increase in enterovirus cases, especially among children, NBC News reported July 6.
In May, the World Health Organization said nine babies in France developed organ failure and sepsis from the infection, and seven died. The WHO pointed to an unusual increase in severe myocarditis and coxsackievirus, a type of enterovirus, in 10 babies in the United Kingdom. One died.
A month prior, an echovirus-11 strain infected twin baby boys in Italy, and required them to be admitted to intensive care, according to a publication in Eurosurveillance.
Physicians in the U.S., which lacks a national surveillance system, are watching more than 100 types of enteroviruses, NBC News reported.
"We're hearing reports from around the country of all of our children's hospitals having some degree of significant enterovirus this summer," Buddy Creech, MD, a pediatric infectious disease physician at Nashville, Tenn.-based Vanderbilt University Medical Center, told the news outlet.
Enteroviruses are common and most inflict a mild disease in infected patients, but with the higher severity in enterovirus cases around the world, health experts are concerned about a spike this summer. There are no treatments approved for such young children, the report said.
The WHO is expected to update reports of enterovirus-related neonatal sepsis later this week, NBC News reported.