Hemorrhagic Fever with Renal Syndrome

ABSTRACT

Hemorrhagic fever with renal syndrome (HFRS) is an acute febrile illness caused by Eurasian hantaviruses and characterized by renal insufficiency, hemorrhage, thrombocytopenia, and shock. Each hantavirus is primarily associated with a single rodent host species or genus, and is transmitted to human via aerosols of rodent excreta. During the last decades, clinical features of HFRS in Korea have changed with mild degree of hypotension and very low prevalence of oliguria. Treatment of HFRS is mainly supportive. Recently, however, treatment of HFRS patients with ribavirin in China and Korea, within 7 days after the onset of fever, resulted in a reduced mortality as well as shortened course of illness. Although a commercial inactivated Hantaan virus vaccine has been on the market in Korea for more than 15 years, the effect of vaccination is not clear. Further efforts are necessary to develop safer and more effective hantavirus vaccines.