TY - JOUR AU - Chowers, Michal AU - Lang, Ruth AU - Nassar, Faris AU - Ben-David, Debora AU - Giladi, Michael AU - Rubinshtein, Eitan AU - Itzhaki, Avi AU - Mishal, Josef AU - Siegman-Igra, Yardena AU - Kitzes, Ruth AU - Pick, Neora AU - Landau, Zvi AU - Wolf, Dana AU - Bin, Hanna AU - Mendelson, Ella AU - Pitlik, Silvio AU - Weinberger, Miriam T1 - Clinical Characteristics of the West Nile Fever Outbreak, Israel, 2000 T2 - Emerging Infectious Disease journal PY - 2001 VL - 7 IS - 4 SP - 675 SN - 1080-6059 AB - West Nile (WN) virus is endemic in Israel. The last reported outbreak had occurred in 1981. From August to October 2000, a large-scale epidemic of WN fever occurred in Israel; 417 cases were confirmed, with 326 hospitalizations. The main clinical presentations were encephalitis (57.9%), febrile disease (24.4%), and meningitis (15.9%). Within the study group, 33 (14.1%) hospitalized patients died. Mortality was higher among patients >70 years (29.3%). On multivariate regressional analysis, independent predictors of death were age >70 years (odds ratio [OR] 7.7), change in level of consciousness (OR 9.0), and anemia (OR 2.7). In contrast to prior reports, WN fever appears to be a severe illness with high rate of central nervous system involvement and a particularly grim outcome in the elderly. KW - West Nile virus KW - West Nile fever KW - Israel KW - outbreak KW - clinical characteristics KW - human DO - 10.3201/eid0704.017414 UR - https://wwwnc.cdc.gov/eid/article/7/4/01-7414_article ER - End of Reference