1978 Volume 28 Issue 1 Pages 1-9
The etiological significance of human reovirus-like agent (HRLA) has recently been established in acute nonbacterial gastroenteritis of infants and children. It is yet impossible to prepare a large amount of virus antigen for a serological survey because of lack of cell cultures suitable for virus multiplication. The present study was performed to measure complement-fixing (CF), neutralizing (NT) and precipitating (PT, detectable by counter-immunoelectro-osmophoresis developed by Middleton et al.) antibody titers in human serum by using Nebrasca calf diarrhea virus (NCDV) cross-reacting with HRLA as antigen. Its results were compared with those obtained by the CF test with HRLA antigen prepared from human stool specimens. Antibody titrations were carried out by the microtiter technique.
1. When paired or triplicate serum samples from patients with this disease were examined, it was found that the increase of HRLA-CF antibody strongly correlated with that of NCDV-NT and NCDV-PT antibodies, and to a lesser extent with that of NCDV-CF antibody.
2. Age distribution of NCDV-NT and NCDV-CF antibodies was examined by using sera from human beings without the disease. It was found that individuals with relatively high titers of both antibodies began to increase in number at about one year of age. Then the NT antibody-positive rate increased with the advance in age, reaching 96% at 20-26 years of age, while the CF antibody-positive rate tended to decrease at 15 years and over of age, showing 63% among adults.
From these results, the NCDV-NT test is considered to be the most suitable of all the tests examined for a seroepidemiologic survey, as a substitute for the HRLA-CF test at present.
