TY - JOUR
T1 - Severe acute hepatitis and acute liver failure of unknown origin in children
T2 - a questionnaire-based study within 34 paediatric liver centres in 22 European countries and Israel, April 2022
AU - de Kleine, Ruben H.
AU - Lexmond, Willem S.
AU - Buescher, Gustav
AU - Sturm, Ekkehard
AU - Kelly, Deidre
AU - Lohse, Ansgar W.
AU - Lenz, Dominic
AU - Jørgensen, Marianne H. rby
AU - Protopapa, Panayiota
AU - Shteyer, Eyal
AU - Iorio, Raffaele
AU - Pukite, Ieva
AU - Kucinskiene, Ruta
AU - Grima, Anne-Marie
AU - Koot, Bart
AU - Pop, Tudor Lucian
AU - de Bruyne, Ruth
AU - Stephenne, null
AU - Vukovic, Jurica
AU - Mitrova, Katarina
AU - Kvistgaard, Helene
AU - Merras-Salmio, Laura
AU - Héry, Geraldine
AU - Debray, Dominique
AU - Ruiz, Mathias
AU - Schulz-Jürgensen, Sebastian
AU - Lurz, Eberhard
AU - Hives, Virag
AU - Cananzi, Mara
AU - D'Antiga, Lorenzo
AU - di Giorgio, Angelo
AU - Pinon, Michele
AU - Kamińska, Diana
AU - Costa, Isabel Gonçalves
AU - Brecelj, Jernej
AU - Bartolo, Gema Muñoz
AU - Quintero, Jesús
AU - Fischler, Björn
AU - the contributors to the survey
AU - McLin, Valerie
N1 - Funding Information: We acknowledge the help of M. Faber, Gastrointestinal Infections, Zoonosis and Tropical Infections (Division 35), Department for Infectious Disease Epidemiology, Robert Koch Institute, Berlin, Germany for his help and expertise in the field of epidemiology. Publisher Copyright: © 2022 European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC). All rights reserved.
PY - 2022/5/12
Y1 - 2022/5/12
N2 - To detect potential concern about severe acute hepatitis in children, we conducted a survey among 50 ERN RARE-LIVER centres. By 26 April 2022, 34 centres, including 25 transplant centres, reported an estimated median of 3-5, 0-2 and 3-5 cases in 2021, 2020 and 2019 and a mean of 2 (range: 0-8) cases between January and April 2022 (mean in 10 large liver transplant centres: 3). Twelve centres reported suspicion of an increase, but no rise. Following a report by the United Kingdom (UK) on 5 April 2022 on the occurrence of cases of severe acute hepatitis in children aged 16 years or under, the World Health Organization (WHO) raised concerns about the possibility of an epidemic [1,2]. By 21 April, 169 possible or confirmed cases were reported fulfilling the WHO case definition [3]. The cause of the hepatitis is unknown but a link to a virus infection has been suggested due to the epidemiological pattern of cases [4,5]. The hepatitis can progress to paediatric acute liver failure (pALF) necessitating urgent liver transplantation to avoid multi-organ failure [6]. We intended to assess whether a rise in incidence of severe acute hepatitis or pALF could be observed between 1 January and 26 April 2022 in comparison to previous years, within the European Reference Network on Hepatological Diseases (ERN RARE-LIVER) [7].
AB - To detect potential concern about severe acute hepatitis in children, we conducted a survey among 50 ERN RARE-LIVER centres. By 26 April 2022, 34 centres, including 25 transplant centres, reported an estimated median of 3-5, 0-2 and 3-5 cases in 2021, 2020 and 2019 and a mean of 2 (range: 0-8) cases between January and April 2022 (mean in 10 large liver transplant centres: 3). Twelve centres reported suspicion of an increase, but no rise. Following a report by the United Kingdom (UK) on 5 April 2022 on the occurrence of cases of severe acute hepatitis in children aged 16 years or under, the World Health Organization (WHO) raised concerns about the possibility of an epidemic [1,2]. By 21 April, 169 possible or confirmed cases were reported fulfilling the WHO case definition [3]. The cause of the hepatitis is unknown but a link to a virus infection has been suggested due to the epidemiological pattern of cases [4,5]. The hepatitis can progress to paediatric acute liver failure (pALF) necessitating urgent liver transplantation to avoid multi-organ failure [6]. We intended to assess whether a rise in incidence of severe acute hepatitis or pALF could be observed between 1 January and 26 April 2022 in comparison to previous years, within the European Reference Network on Hepatological Diseases (ERN RARE-LIVER) [7].
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85130635791&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - https://doi.org/10.2807/1560-7917.ES.2022.27.19.2200369
DO - https://doi.org/10.2807/1560-7917.ES.2022.27.19.2200369
M3 - Article
C2 - 35551705
SN - 1025-496X
VL - 27
JO - Euro surveillance
JF - Euro surveillance
IS - 19
M1 - 2200369
ER -