What is the Norovirus? | Viruses

What is the Norovirus?

Norovirus is the main cause of viral diarrhoea and vomiting besides rotavirus: The virus nests in the early small intestine and causes a decline of the intestinal cells there. As a result, the intestine can no longer absorb enough water from the stool and severe diarrhoea results. However, the disease is mainly characterized by strong vomiting and violent abdominal cramps.

The symptoms last only two to three days and then disappear on their own. The disease mainly affects children shortly before school age. It can be dangerous for people who do not drink enough water to compensate for the loss because of the severe fluid loss. In this specific case it is small children and old people who, in the worst case, can “dry out”. The disease is treated purely symptomatically: people are given more fluids and an attempt is made to maintain the salt balance of the patients.

What is the hepatitis virus?

Basically, one cannot speak of “the” hepatitis virus. At least five hepatitis viruses are currently known to researchers. From hepatitis A to hepatitis E, the viruses differ both in their clinical pictures and in their danger for humans.

Even though there are several hundred thousand hepatitis sufferers in Germany, this virus is more of a problem in developing and emerging countries. In Germany, patients can be helped very well – provided they undergo medical treatment – so that the probability of dying from a hepatitis infection is very low.

• While hepatitis A is responsible for acute inflammation in almost 99% of cases, which subsides after about a week, the two best known hepatitis types, hepatitis B and hepatitis C, are more dangerous for humans.
• Hepatitis B is a disease that affects about 400 million people worldwide and against which a vaccination is available.

  Transmission is usually through contaminated blood and the disease can lead to liver cirrhosis in the advanced stages or, in the worst case, to liver cancer.

• Hepatitis C affects about 170 million people worldwide and is now very treatable thanks to modern drugs. Here too, infection usually occurs through infectious blood and the disease can lead to liver cirrhosis or, in the worst case, liver cancer.
• Hepatitis D is a so-called superinfection. It occurs almost only in combination with hepatitis B disease and can best be fought by a vaccination against hepatitis B, since the two forms are very similar in their surface characteristics.
• Hepatitis E, similar to hepatitis A, mainly causes acute inflammation of the liver and only becomes a chronic disease to a very small extent. A vaccination is not yet available, but the disease can be cured by medication.