Chandipura Virus (CHPV)
Why in News?
Recently health authorities have tracked confirmed and suspected cases spanning across Sabarkantha, Panchmahal, and Banaskantha districts in Gujarat, alongside linked cases in Rajasthan.
Pathogen Nature & Origin
- Classification: CHPV is an enveloped, bullet-shaped, negative-sense single-stranded RNA virus.
- Family: It belongs to the Vesiculovirus genus of the Rhabdoviridae family—the same viral family that contains the rabies virus.
- Discovery: First isolated by the National Institute of Virology (NIV) in 1965 during a febrile outbreak in Chandipur village, Maharashtra, India.
- Target Demographics: It almost exclusively impacts children under the age of 15 due to their developing immune and nervous systems.
- High Lethality: It exhibits an alarming case fatality rate (CFR) ranging from 56% to 75%.
Mode of Transmission
- Primary Vector: Transmitted through the bite of infected sandflies, specifically Phlebotomus spp.
- Secondary Vectors: Ticks and certain mosquito species (like Aedes aegypti) can also act as carriers.
- No Human-to-Human Spread: The virus cannot be transmitted directly from person to person through casual contact or coughing.
- Environmental Factor: Poor sanitation, rural mud walls, and open drainage create massive breeding grounds for sandflies.
Symptoms & Pathogenesis
- Rapid Progression: Symptoms escalate violently within an extreme critical window of 24 to 48 hours.
- Initial Phase: Sudden high-grade fever, severe flu-like body aches, headaches, vomiting, and diarrhea.
- Neurological Phase: The virus breaches the blood-brain barrier, attacking neurons and triggering Acute Encephalitis Syndrome (AES).
- Advanced Complications: Severe convulsions (seizures), altered mental states, respiratory distress, coma, and rapid death.
Diagnosis, Treatment & Prevention
- Diagnostic Test: Infection is definitively confirmed using real-time Reverse Transcriptase PCR (RT-PCR) testing.
- No Specific Cure: There is no approved antiviral drug and no licensed vaccine available globally.
- Supportive Management: Treatment relies entirely on emergency intensive care, including managing brain swelling (edema), seizure control, fluid balance, and mechanical ventilation.
- Vector Control: Prevention involves indoor residual insecticide dusting, wearing full clothing, using sandfly-netting, and eliminating stagnation around homes.
