Rotavirus infections - Guidelines for treatment and prevention

The classification of rotaviruses as well as the pathogenesis and the diagn osis of rotavirus infections are briefly reviewed. Treatment of rotavirus d isease consists mainly of oral or intravenous rehydration, using World Heal th Organization-recommended oral rehydration solutions or lactated Ringer's solutions, respectively, Specific antivirals have been tried in animal mod els but are not used for human treatment at present. The epidemiology of ro taviruses is complex as at any one time and in any geographical area differ ent types co-circulate. The development of rotavirus candidate vaccines is reviewed, one of which, the tetravalent, rhesus rotavirus-based human reass ortant vaccine, was licensed for universal use in the US in 1998. Its imple mentation requires careful surveillance of co-circulating rotavirus types ( molecular epidemiology) as well as of any potential adverse effects not pre viously detected.