Shamonda virus: First human case is ‘an alert’, not a reason to panic, says EU health agency

Europe’s public health authorities need to be aware of the first human case of Shamonda virus confirmed in France, but not “panic,” the ECDC told Euronews, as investigations into the patient’s death continue. French authorities confirmed on Thursday a Shamonda virus infection in a patient in Lyon who died in early October, marking the first time the virus, previously seen only in animals, mainly cattle, has been reported in a human. “This is a very special case,” Tamás Bakonyi, principal expert on vector-borne and zoonotic diseases and one health-related issues at the ECDC, told Euronews.The affected patient had leukaemia and was “severely immunocompromised,” making it easier for the virus to infect the person. “The whole process of viral infections or other kinds of infections are behaving differently in those [immunocompromised] individuals than in healthy people,” Bakonyi said.