FRANCE. – The Shamonda virus, which has until now been found mainly in animals, has been confirmed in a human for the first time after a severely immunocompromised patient in France was diagnosed with the virus. The patient, who had a severely weakened immune system, died in early October. French health authorities say that according to current knowledge, no public health risk for the general population has been identified.
The European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) confirmed on 22 October that the case is being investigated to establish how the person became infected and what role the virus played in the death. French authorities suspect that the infection was transmitted through the bite of an infected mosquito. The Shamonda virus is usually spread between animals by such biting insects and has been found in cattle, among others. The virus was first identified in Nigeria in the mid-1960s and has also been found previously in parts of Africa and Japan. It was first detected in farm animals in Europe in 2026.
There is currently no confirmed evidence of human-to-human transmission. French authorities and the ECDC are monitoring the situation as more information about the exceptional case is gathered.
This article is an automatic English translation of a Nuusflits article originally published in Afrikaans. Read the Afrikaans original.
