National Pesticide Information Center - West Nile Virus and Your Health

West Nile Virus and Your Health

West Nile Virus Health Effects:

The West Nile virus can result in encephalitis in approximately 1% of persons infected. Below are links to information describing symptoms of WNV infection.

CDC Questions and Answers - Symptoms
CDC - West Nile Virus Clinical Guidance (this page offers health and public health professionals West Nile virus-related clinical information and guidance).
NIOSH - Recommendations for Protecting Laboratory, Field, and Clinical Workers from West Nile Virus Exposure
NIOSH - Recommendations for Protecting Outdoor Workers from West Nile Virus Exposure
FDA - FDA Approves First Fully Automated Test to Screen for West Nile Virus in Blood and Tissue Donors
FDA - R ecommendations for the Assessment of Donor Suitability and Blood and Blood Product Safety in Cases of Known or Suspected West Nile Virus Infection
Blood Banks in a 'Race Against the Mosquitoes'. Science Magazine Volume 299, Number 5614, Issue of 21 Mar 2003, p. 1824.
West Nile Virus Symptoms and Care - New York City Department of Health
American Academy of Pediatrics - Calming West Nile Fears, September 2002
Should I Worry about West Nile Virus? - Kidshealth.com (The Nemours Foundation)
West Nile Virus: Schools, Day Camps and Child Care - New York City Department of Health
West Nile Virus - University of Pennsylvania Health System
West Nile Virus Investigation Update (West Nile Virus Detection in Breast Milk) - CDC Telebriefing Transcript, September 27, 2002
Depression after West Nile virus (WNV) infection - CDC

top of page

About the Virus:

West Nile virus is an enveloped, single-stranded RNA virus that belongs to the flaviviridae family which also includes Japanese Encephalitis, St. Louis Encephalitis, Dengue Fever, and Yellow Fever. Select links below to learn more about the virology of the West Nile virus.

top of page

Is There a Vaccine for the West Nile Virus?

At this time there is no available human vaccine for the West Nile virus (WNV). In 2000, The National Institutes of Health awarded a grant to Acambis (formerly OraVax, Inc.), a U.S. subsidiary of Peptide Therapeutics Group, to "fast track" a West Nile virus vaccine. Select links below to learn more about a WNV vaccine.

Cost-effectiveness of West Nile Virus Vaccination. Emerg Inf Dis 2006 Mar; 12(3).
Efficacy of Killed Virus Vaccine, Live Attenuated Chimeric Virus Vaccine, and Passive
Immunization for Prevention of West Nile virus Encephalitis in Hamster Model. Emerg Inf Dis 2002 December; 8(12).
Fact Sheet: NIAID Research on West Nile and Related Viruses, April 2006 - (Clinical Trial)
Acambis - West Nile Virus Vaccine
Pre-clinical trials of ChimeriVax-West Nile - Acambis News, September 27, 2002
Scientists predict vaccine against West Nile virus within three years - USA Today, Sept 25, 2002
Immunization with Heterologous Flaviviruses Protective Against Fatal West Nile Encephalitis. Emerg Inf Dis 2002 March; 8(3).
BBC News March 5, 2002 - Vaccine Developed for West Nile Virus
West Nile Virus/Dengue Type 4 Virus Chimeras that are Reduced in Neurovirulence and Peripheral Virulence Without Loss of Immunogenicity or Protective Efficacy. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA, Vol. 99, Issue 5, 3036-3041, March 5, 2002.
Two Viruses Team Up in West Nile Vaccine - National Institutes of Health News Release, March 4, 2002.
Flavivirus DNA Vaccines: Current Status and Potential. Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, 2001. 951:272-285.
Current Status of Flavivirus Vaccines. Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, 2001. 951:262-271.
Use of Live and Inactivated Vaccines in the Control of West Nile Fever in Domestic Geese. Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, 2001. 951:255-261.
Prospects for Development of a Vaccine against the West Nile Virus. Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, 2001. 951:1-12.
West Nile Drugs, Vaccine Still Years Away. Science 2000 290:1483.

top of page

Scientific Journal Articles:

Below are selected journal articles on the West Nile virus. Many of the journal articles below are accessed through PubMed, a bibliographic database from the National Institutes of Health. If you would like to see an article posted below that is currently not listed, please fill out this comments form and tell us about it.

West Nile Virus - Medline Plus Health Information
West Nile Virus Infections Projected from Blood Donor Screening Data, United States, 2003. Emerg Inf Dis 2006 Mar; 12(3).
West Nile Virus-associated Flaccid Paralysis Outcome. Emerg Inf Dis 2006 Mar; 12(3).
CCR5 Deficiency Increases Risk of Symptomatic West Nile Virus Infection. JEM Online, Jan 17, 2006.
West Nile Virus Infections in Organ Transplant Recipients - New York and Pennsylvania, August-September, 2005. MMWR, October 5, 2005/54(Dispatch):1-3.
West Nile Virus Detection in Kidney, Cloacal, and Nasopharyngeal Specimens. Emerg Inf Dis 2005 Sep; 11(9).
The Epidemiology and Early Clinical Features of West Nile Virus Infection. Am J Emerg Med, July 2005; 23(4)
Use of RNA Interference to Prevent Lethal Murine West Nile Virus Infection. J Infect Dis, April 1, 2005; 191(7): 1148-54.
Novel Flavivirus or New Lineage of West Nile Virus, Central Europe. Emerg Inf Dis 2005 Feb; 11(2).
Differential Virulence of West Nile Strains for American Crows. Emerg Infect Dis 2004 Dec;10(12).
West Nile Virus Blood Transfusion-Related Infection Despite Nucleic Acid Testing. Transfusion, December 2004; 44: 1695-1699.
Transfusion Associated Transmission of West Nile Virus - Arizona, 2004. MMWR, Sept 17, 2004/53(32):842-844.
Possible Dialysis-Related West Nile Virus Transmission - Georgia, 2003. MMWR, Aug 20, 2004/53(36):738-739.
Pesticide Spraying for West Nile Virus Control and Emergency Department Asthma Visits in New York City, 2000 (pdf). Environ Health Perspect. Aug 2004; 112(11): 1183-1187.
Long-Term Prognosis for Clinical West Nile Virus Infection. Emerg Inf Dis 2004 Aug; 10(8).
Enhancing West Nile Virus Surveillance, United States. Emerg Inf Dis 2004 June; 10(6).
Interim Guidelines for the Evaluation of Infants Born to Mothers Infected with West Nile Virus During Pregnancy. MMWR, Feb 27, 2004/53(07):154-157.
Update: Detection of West Nile Virus in Blood Donations - United States, 2003. MMWR, Sept 18, 2003/52(dispatch):1-3.
Neurologic Manifestations and Outcome of West Nile Virus Infection. JAMA, July 23, 2003; 290(4): 511-515.
Early-Season Avian Deaths from West Nile Virus as Warnings of Human Infection. Emerg Inf Dis 2003 April; 9(4).
Intrauterine West Nile Virus Infection - New York, 2002. MMWR, Dec 20, 2002/51(50):1135-1136.
First Isolation of West Nile virus from a Patient with Encephalitis in the United States. Emerg Inf Dis 2002 December; 8(12).
Induction of Inflammation by West Nile virus Capsid through the Caspase-9 Apoptotic Pathway. Emerg Inf Dis 2002 December; 8(12).
Public Health Dispatch: Investigations of West Nile Virus Infections in Recipients of Blood Transfusions. MMWR, Nov 01, 2002/51(43): 973-974.
Possible West Nile Virus Transmission to an Infant Through Breast-Feeding - Michigan, 2002. MMWR, Oct 04, 2002/51(39):877-878.
Update: Investigations of West Nile Virus Infections in Recipients of Organ Transplantation and Blood Transfusion. MMWR, Sept 20, 2002/51(37):833-836.
Acute Flaccid Paralysis Syndrome Associated with West Nile Virus Infection - Mississippi and Louisiana, July--August 2002. MMWR, Sept 20, 2002/51(37):825-828.
Public Health Dispatch: West Nile Virus Infection in Organ Donor and Transplant Recipients - Georgia and Florida, 2002. MMWR, Sept 06, 2002/51(35);790.
Infectious cDNA Clone of the Epidemic West Nile Virus from New York City. J Virol 2002 Jun;76(12): 5847-5856.
Phylogenetic Analysis of a Human Isolate from the 2000 Israel West Nile virus Epidemic. Emerg Inf Dis 2002 May; 8(5).
West Nile Virus: Detection, Surveillance, and Control. Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, Volume 951 published December 2001.
West Nile Encephalitis: The Neuropathy of Four Fatalities. Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, 2001. 951:172-178.
Rapid detection of west nile virus from human clinical specimens, field-collected mosquitoes, and avian samples by a TaqMan reverse transcriptase-PCR assay. J Clin Microbiol 2000 Nov;38(11):4066-71.
Communicating the Threat of Emerging Infections to the Public. Emerg Inf Dis 2000 Aug; 6(4).
Testing for West Nile virus. Lancet 2000 Sep 23;356(9235):1110-1.
The Role of Pathology in an Investigation of an Outbreak of West Nile Encephalitis in New York, 1999. Emerg Inf Dis 2000 Jul-Aug; 6(4).
Guillain-Barre syndrome: An unusual presentation of West Nile virus infection. Neurology 2000 Jul 12;55(1):144-6.
Evaluation of Immunoglobulin M (IgM) and IgG Enzyme Immunoassays in Serologic Diagnosis of West Nile Virus Infection. J Clin Microbiol 2000 June;38(6):2232-9.
The pathology of human West Nile Virus infection. Hum Pathol 2000 May;31(5):527-31.
Detection of West Nile virus sequences in cerebrospinal fluid. Lancet 2000 May 6;355(9215):1614-5.
Genetic analysis of West Nile New York 1999 encephalitis virus. Lancet 1999 Dec 4;354(9194):1971-2.
West Nile virus neuroinvasion and encephalitis induced by macrophage depletion in mice. Arch Virol 1996;141(3-4):459-69.
West Nile virus (Flaviviridae:Flavivirus) in experimentally infected Argas ticks (Acari:Argasidae). Am J Trop Med Hyg May 1993;48(5):726-37.
Detection of West Nile virus by the polymerase chain reaction and analysis of nucleotide sequence variation. Am J Trop Med Hyg 1993 Mar;48(3):440-6.
Isolation of West Nile virus from the brains of children who had died of encephalitis. Bull World Health Organ 1984;62(6):879-82.

top of page