@article{69dd56f2086e4c1aa8864faeda6bdc9c,
title = "Occurrence of rota- and enteroviruses in drinking and environmental water in a developing nation",
abstract = "Rotaviruses have been implicated as a major cause of childhood and traveler's diarrhea in developing countries. Since water is known to be a vehicle of transmission of other enteric viruses, we sought to determine if water could play a role in the transmission of rotavirus infections in a developing nation by applying recently developed techniques for the concentration of viruses from tapwater and environmental (lake, river, ocean and aqueduct) water in Mexico. In an initial survey during the rainy season in August 1978, rotavirus was detected in 10 of 10 drinking water samples and coxsackie B4 or B6 virus in 5 of 10. In a larger survey during the dry season in December 1979, rotavirus was recovered from 3 and enteric viruses from 8 of 21 drinking water samples. Water quality data, available for the 1979 survey, indicated that while many tapwater samples did not meet U.S. coliform standards, some samples containing infectious virus did. Our data suggest that current bacteriological water quality standards for potable water do not reflect viral contamination.",
keywords = "coliforms, drinking water, enteroviruses, rotavirus, standards, water treatment",
author = "Deetz, {Thomas R.} and Smith, {Eric M.} and Goyal, {Sagar M.} and Gerba, {Charles P.} and Vollet, {John J.} and Liane Tsai and DuPont, {Herbert L.} and Keswick, {Bruce H.}",
note = "Funding Information: INTRODUCTION Evidence of rotavirus infection is frequently found among travelers to developing countries (Bolivar et aL, 1978; Keswick et al., 1982). the epidemiology of human rotavirus infections is incompletely understood, but person-to-person transmission has been implicated by studies showing intrafamily spread (Kim et aL, 1977; Wenman et al., 1979). Among travelers, spread from infants, with whom there is generally little contact, seems unlikely. Transmission via food, which has been implicated in entero-toxigenic Escherichia coli infections of travelers (Foster et al., 1980; Tjoa et aL, 1977) has not been examined or not found to be epidemiologically linked. Excretion of large amounts of rotavirus in the feces of infected individuals and its consequent presence in sewage indicate that this virus may also be waterborne (Smith and Gerba, 1982). The present study was undertaken to determine if water may serve as a transmission vehicle for rotavirus. Because disease expression in adults is frequently mild or asymptomatic and the concentration of viruses in potable water is expected to be low, epidemiologic studies would have required too many subjects to be practical for a preliminary study (Melnick et al. 1978). Instead we applied recently developed techniques for This study was supported in part by a contract AI-10266s and a grant E30-1738 from The National Institutes of Health. Bethesda, MD, U.S.A.",
year = "1984",
doi = "10.1016/0043-1354(84)90205-7",
language = "English (US)",
volume = "18",
pages = "567--571",
journal = "Water Research",
issn = "0043-1354",
publisher = "Elsevier Limited",
number = "5",
}