Page 17 - TBE_Book_V2_2019

Chapter 1: A short history of TBE

through Asia and the western TBEV groups to
the west, and they might have reached central
Europe approximately 2000 years ago. Howev-
er, the first isolation of TBEV succeeded only
in 1937.

In the 1930s, a large number of people living
in the taiga in the Far East and Soviet troops
located in that region fell ill with a serious
neurological disease, with a frequently fatal
outcome. The etiology of the disease was un-
known, and first attempts to identify the path- Photo of Lev Zilber from the book “Lev
ogen failed. In 1937, the USSR Ministry of Alexandrovich Zilber” written by his son L.L. Kiselev
Health sent out an expedition, which was led and E.S. Levina, published in 2005 by the publishing
by Lev A. Zilber, the head of the first medical house “Science” in the series “Scientific biographies”
virological laboratory in the country. Zilber put
together a group of very capable and highly Unfortunately, some team members became
motivated young researchers and technical infected with TBEV and developed disease
assistants. They worked in two teams at two symptoms. Fortunately, nobody died – which
different remote places in the taiga under ex- appears almost unavoidable when taking into
tremely difficult conditions. The northern consideration the highly unsafe conditions and
team was working in the Khabarovsk Territory the highly contagious nature of the virus. As
(leader: Elizabeth N. Levkovich) and the south- an example, Dr. Chumakov, who became a
ern team in Primorsky Territory (leader: Alex- famous virologist later on, fell ill with a severe
andra D. Sheboldaeva). No infrastructure for form of TBE after cutting his finger during an
scientific research existed in the area of the autopsy. Residual effects were right-arm pa-
taiga where the disease occurred, so the ralysis and hearing loss. However, this did not
teams had to find simple, practical solutions prevent him from finding new TBEV foci in the
for establishing what they called a scientific Ural and Transural regions, far away from the
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campus. Far East.
The teams started their practical work in mid- Scientifically, the expedition was a great suc-
May 1937, and very soon the first relevant cess. Zilber and the other team members had
results were available. When investigating isolated the causative virus, elucidated the
local people, they found numerous cases with basic eco-epidemiology of the disease, and
neurological symptoms. Twelve out of 64 hos- provided some effective prophylactic infor-
pitalized patients died. The virus was isolated mation on how to avoid an infection. Further
from 29 febrile patients, from diseased mice expeditions were sent out to the Far East to
(after they had been infected with a tick sus- learn more about the virus and the disease
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pension), and from ticks feeding on them. and its prophylaxis.
When team members warned local people to
avoid tick bites, the number of new cases dis- The first cases of TBE in China were reported
tinctly decreased. So there was compelling in 1943, and the causative virus was isolated
evidence at the end of that mission in mid- in 1944 from brain samples of patients who
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August that the team had found the causative had died (reviewed in Yoshii et al., 2017).
viral agent, with Ixodes persulcatus ticks as the
vectors.

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