Severe pigeon paramyxovirus 1 infection in a human case with probable post-COVID-19 condition.

Pigeon paramyxovirus 1 (PPMV-1) is an antigenic host variant of avian paramyxovirus 1. Sporadic outbreaks of PPMV-1 infection have occurred in pigeons in China; however, few cases of human PPMV-1 infection have been reported. The purpose of this article is to report a case of severe human PPMV-1 infection in an individual with probable post-COVID-19 syndrome (long COVID) who presented with rapidly progressing pulmonary infection. The patient was a 66-year-old man who was admitted to the intensive care unit 11 days after onset of pneumonia and recovered 64 days after onset. PPMV-1 was isolated from the patient's sputum and in cloacal smear samples from domesticated pigeons belonging to the patient's neighbour. Residual severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 was detected in respiratory and anal swab samples from the patient. Sequencing analyses revealed that the PPMV-1 genome belonged to genotype VI.2.1.1.2.2 and had the 112RRQKRF117 motif in the cleavage site of the fusion protein, which is indicative of high virulence. This case of cross-species transmission of PPMV-1 from a pigeon to a human highlights the risk of severe PPMV-1 infection in immunocompromised patients, especially those with long COVID. Enhanced surveillance for increased risk of severe viral infection is warranted in this population.

Effects of school breaks on influenza-like illness incidence in a temperate Chinese region: an ecological study from 2008 to 2015.

OBJECTIVE: To assess the effects of winter/summer school breaks on occurrences of influenza-like illness (ILI). METHODS: We jointly analysed ILI surveillance data with the timing of school breaks in a temperate district in Beijing, China from 2008 to 2015. ILI incidence rate ratios (IRRs) of schoolchildren (5-14 and 15-24 years of age) to adults (25-59 and >60 years of age) were used to measure the age shift of ILI incidence before, during and after the 4-week winter/7-week summer breaks. Serfling-based Poisson regression model with adjustment for unmeasured confounders was built to further assess the effect of winter school breaks. RESULTS: ILI incidences were consistently lower during winter breaks than before winter breaks for all age groups. IRRs of younger schoolchildren aged 5-14 to adults were higher during winter school breaks than before breaks, while the opposite was true for the IRRs of older schoolchildren aged 15-24 to adults. Schoolchildren-to-adults IRRs during summer breaks were significantly lower than before or after school breaks (p<0.001). CONCLUSIONS: Both winter and summer breaks were associated with reductions of ILI incidences among schoolchildren and adults. Our study contributes additional evidence on the effects of school breaks on ILI incidence, suggesting school closure could be effective in controlling influenza transmission in developing countries.

Coherence of Influenza Surveillance Data across Different Sources and Age Groups, Beijing, China, 2008-2015.

Influenza is active during the winter and spring in the city of Beijing, which has a typical temperate climate with four clear distinct seasons. The clinical and laboratory surveillance data for influenza have been used to construct critical indicators for influenza activities in the community, and previous studies have reported varying degrees of association between laboratory-confirmed influenza specimens and outpatient consultation rates of influenza-like illness in subtropical cities. However, few studies have reported on this issue for cities in temperate regions, especially in developing countries. Furthermore, the mechanism behind age-specific seasonal epidemics remains unresolved, although it has been widely discussed. We utilized a wavelet analysis method to monitor the coherence of weekly percentage of laboratory-confirmed influenza specimens with the weekly outpatient consultation rates of influenza-like illness in Beijing, China. We first examined the seasonal pattern of laboratory-confirmed cases of influenza A (subtyped into seasonal A(H1N1) and A(H3N2) and pandemic virus A(H1N1) pdm09) and influenza B separately within the period from 2008-2015; then, we detected the coherence of clinical and laboratory surveillance data in this district, specially examining weekly time series of age-specific epidemics of influenza-like illnesses in the whole study period for three age categories (age 0-5, 5-15 and 25-60). We found that influenza A and B were both active in winter but were not always seasonally synchronous in Beijing. Synchronization between age ranges was found in most epidemic peaks from 2008-2015. Our findings suggested that peaks of influenza-like illness in individuals aged 0-5 and 5-15 years consistently appeared ahead of those of adults, implying the possibility that schoolchildren may lead epidemic fluctuations.