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January 03, 2003

INTERNATIONAL IMMUNIZATION NEWS

"Reports Do Not Indicate Poliomyelitis"

Press Trust of India (www.ptinews.com) (01/01/03)

The National Institute of Communicable Diseases has completed tests in response to reports indicating that eight people in Tamil Nadu, a village in India's Tiruvallur district, experienced numbness and other symptoms of paralysis last year.  According to the reports, issued between the beginning of February and mid-March of 2002, three of the people affected died.  The government now has confirmed that tests do not indicate the presence of poliomyelitis.  The institute tested stool and serum samples and, in two instances, isolated poliovirus type III, a vaccine virus and not a wild virus.  Authorities also say tests did not locate antibodies against poliovirus in samples from area goats, 200 of which died of an unidentified condition around the time villagers became ill.  Samples from some healthy goats did show antibodies like those of polio, but a reaction between other viruses could be the cause.  Authorities are continuing to research the goats' illness.

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