Update on Hendra virus

Hendra virus is the most important infectious disease of horses in Australia, due to the high mortality rate in affected horses and the catastrophic consequence of zoonotic transmission of this virus to people. Hendra virus (then called equine morbillivirus) was first recognised in 1994 as a cause of severe acute respiratory disease of horses with high mortality [1,2]. Since then there has been numerous further outbreaks reported in horses, in the majority of which only a single horse was affected. In total, 7 human cases of Hendra have been reported, 4 of them fatal [3]. Veterinarians and staff are the group that are most at risk from this virus. To date, 3 of the 7 human cases have been veterinarians (2 fatal) and another 2 cases involved people assisting vets, (one was a veterinary nurse working in an equine hospital and the other was assisting an equine post mortem examination).
The natural hosts of Hendra virus are 4 species of fruit bats [4]; however, the exact mechanism of transmission of virus from bats to other mammalian species is unknown. Hendra virus circulates within bat populations, generally with no disease manifestations following experimental infection [4]. Hendra virus has been detected in fetal and neonatal lung and from uterine fluid and renal tissue of adult bats [4–6]. Collection of urine and faeces from beneath flying fox roosting sites have shown that Hendra virus is excreted in detectable titres in these body fluids [7] and this is likely to be a source of virus for transmission to other animal species. […]