RESUMO
<p><b>OBJECTIVE</b>To investigate the epidemiological characteristus of human caliciviruses (HuCVs) among children under 5 years of age with acute diarrhea and to estimate the disease burden in Lulong county.</p><p><b>METHODS</b>HuCVs were detected by enzyme linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) and reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR). Some PCR amplicons were cloned and sequenced. Phylogenetic tree was constructed for strain characterization. The rate of HuCVs-attributed hospitalization was estimated according to the positive rate of HuCVs detection in fecal specimens collected from hospitalized diarrhea patients.</p><p><b>RESULTS</b>Between July 1999 and June 2001, 708 fecal specimens were collected, of which 393 rotavirus-negative and 5 rotavirus-positive specimens were detected for HuCVs. Thirty-one point six percentage of fecal specimens from patients with diarrhea was HuCVs positive. Among inpatients, HuCVs positive rate was 17.5%. HuCVs detection was mainly distributed in 3 - 17 mouth-old children, in winter. All 11 strains belonged to NLV GII in which 6 strains GII-3, 2 strains GII-4 and 3 strains GII-7, and they shared 55.1% - 100% nucleotide identity. NLV GII-4 and GII-7 were identified in 2000, while NLV GII-3 and GII-7 in 2001. The preliminary estimate of HuCVs-attributed hospitalization rate was 3.6 per thousand.</p><p><b>CONCLUSION</b>Human caliciviruses with different genotypes circulated among children in Lulong county with GII NLVs were the prevalent strains. The disease burden of HuCVs was second to rotavirus.</p>