Virologic study of acute lower respiratory tract infections in children admitted to the paediatric department of Blida University Hospital, Algeria

Derrar, F.; Izri, K.; Kaddache, C.; Boukari, R.; Hannoun, D.

In our overall sample of children aged 15 days to 2 years, the average age of infants was 4.6 months, and 90% of them were younger than 12 months. RSV was responsible for respiratory This rate is comparable to what has already been reported in other studies using the same method for detecting viruses by real-time PCR, with rates described as ranging from 44% to 49% [7, 11, 14, 19] . Even higher RSV positivity rates of about 50% have been reported [19] . This nonsegmented RNA virus of the family Paramyxoviridae is one of the main virus agents responsible for paediatric respiratory infections in the world [20] and is also the primary cause of paediatric hospitalization. This virus can infect children despite the presence of maternal antibodies; natural infection offers only partial protection [21] . RSV type B was found to be the most common in our study; some publications have shown that group A was associated with more severe forms of bronchiolitis, which is not the case here. RSV was identified in 3-month-old infants in an average of 84.2% of cases; average age was under 6 months. Children infected with RSV are younger than those not infected with RSV at 3.1 months versus 5.9 months. Young age is identified as the main risk factor for severe bronchiolitis [22] . Acute viral bronchiolitis does not spare newborns [23] .