New Respiratory Viruses and the Elderly

Jartti, Laura; Langen, Henriikka; Söderlund-Venermo, Maria; Vuorinen, Tytti; Ruuskanen, Olli; Jartti, Tuomas

In addition to the previously known polyomaviruses, BK and JC, seven new human polyomaviruses have been identified in rapid sequence in 2007-2011. Two of them, detected in the respiratory tract samples, have been named by the institutes where they have been found: KI (Karolinska Institute) polyomavirus (KIPyV) and WU (Washington University) polyomavirus (WUPyV) [25, 26] . Two have been named by the diseases in association with which they were detected, MCPyV from a skin cancer called Merkel-cell carcinoma and TSPyV from a skin disease called trichodysplasia spinulosa [102, 103] . The remaining three polyomaviruses were also detected in skin samples, and named by numbers, PyV6, 7 and 9 [104] [105] [106] . The prevalence of the respiratory KI-and WU-polyomaviruses is 2-7% in patients with respiratory symptoms [25, 26] . Most patients with KI-or WUPyV DNA in their upper airways, are young children with symptoms of rhinitis, cough, bronchiolitis and even pneumonia. Serologic studies show seroprevalences of 50 to 80% for KI-and WUPyVs in healthy children and adults [108] [109] [110] .