Dengue virus type 4 in Niterói, Rio de Janeiro: the role of molecular techniques in laboratory diagnosis and entomological surveillance

• Main Authors: Márcia Gonçalves de Castro, Rita Maria Ribeiro Nogueira, Ana Maria Bispo de Filippis, Anielly Alves Ferreira, Monique da Rocha Queiroz Lima, Nieli Rodrigues da Costa Faria, Fernanda de Bruycker Nogueira, Jaqueline Bastos Santos Simões, Priscila Conrado Guerra Nunes, Simone Alves Sampaio, Ricardo Lourenço-de-Oliveira, Flávia Barreto dos Santos
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Instituto Oswaldo Cruz, Ministério da Saúde 2012-11-01
• Series: Memórias do Instituto Oswaldo Cruz.
• Subjects: dengue virus type 4; Aedes aegypti; RT-PCR; real-time RT-PCR; SimplexaTM Dengue real-time RT-PCR
• Online Access: http://www.scielo.br/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S0074-02762012000700017&lng=en&tlng=en

In Niterói, state of Rio de Janeiro, dengue virus type 4 (DENV-4) was isolated for the first time in March 2011. We analysed the laboratory findings of the first cases and evaluated the use of molecular techniques for the detection of DENV-4 in Aedes aegypti that were field-caught. Conventional reverse transcriptase-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) and SimplexaTM Dengue real-time RT-PCR confirmed DENV-4 infection in all cases. Additionally, DENV-4 was confirmed in a female Ae. aegypti with 1.08 x 10³ copies/mL of virus, as determined by quantitative real-time RT-PCR. This is the first time the SimplexaTM Dengue real-time assay has been used for the classification of cases of infection and for entomological investigations. The use of these molecular techniques was shown to be important for the surveillance of dengue in humans and vectors.