Abstract
We describe a lethal respiratory outbreak among wild chimpanzees in Uganda in 2013 for which molecular and epidemiologic analyses implicate human rhinovirus C as the cause. Postmortem samples from an infant chimpanzee yielded near-complete genome sequences throughout the respiratory tract; other pathogens were absent. Epidemiologic modeling estimated the basic reproductive number (R0) for the epidemic as 1.83, consistent with the common cold in humans. Genotyping of 41 chimpanzees and examination of 24 published chimpanzee genomes from subspecies across Africa showed universal homozygosity for the cadherin-related family member 3 CDHR3-Y529 allele, which increases risk for rhinovirus C infection and asthma in human children. These results indicate that chimpanzees exhibit a species-wide genetic susceptibility to rhinovirus C and that this virus, heretofore considered a uniquely human pathogen, can cross primate species barriers and threatens wild apes. We advocate engineering interventions and prevention strategies for rhinovirus infections for both humans and wild apes.
Highlights
We describe a lethal respiratory outbreak among wild chimpanzees in Uganda in 2013 for which molecular and epidemiologic analyses implicate human rhinovirus C as the cause
Subsequent quantitative PCR (qPCR) confirmed infection with RV-C, with viral loads of 7.41 × copies/swab in the oropharynx, 1.05 × copies/swab in the trachea, and 1.74 × 106 copies/swab in the lung; these values are comparable to the average viral load (7.76 × 106 copies/mL) found in rhinovirus C‒infected children with acute wheezing illness treated in an emergency department [27]
Further sequencing yielded a near-complete rhinovirus C genome consisting of a complete polyprotein gene of 6,450 bases, a complete 3′ untranslated region (UTR) of 35 bases excluding the poly(A) tail, and a partial 5′-UTR of 480 bases
Summary
We describe a lethal respiratory outbreak among wild chimpanzees in Uganda in 2013 for which molecular and epidemiologic analyses implicate human rhinovirus C as the cause. Genotyping of 41 chimpanzees and examination of 24 published chimpanzee genomes from subspecies across Africa showed universal homozygosity for the cadherin-related family member 3 CDHR3-Y529 allele, which increases risk for rhinovirus C infection and asthma in human children. These results indicate that chimpanzees exhibit a species-wide genetic susceptibility to rhinovirus C and that this virus, heretofore considered a uniquely human pathogen, can cross primate species barriers and threatens wild apes. We were able to identify rhinovirus C, a pathogen not previously known to infect species other than humans, as the causative agent of an epidemic of respiratory disease in chimpanzees by directly sampling the lesions
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