Known for striking down hundreds on cruise ships and quarantining its victims in bathrooms, the latest strain of the infamous stomach bug, norovirus, has arrived. The new strain that originated in Australia has now been reported in millions of people worldwide, including a number of cases in Charlottesville.
Charlottesville emergency rooms have recently seen an influx of visits related to the GII.4 Sydney strain of the norovirus, which like the rest of the virus strains, usually causes patients one to three days of diarrhea, vomiting and/or mild fevers, said Dr. Robert Reiser, associate professor of emergency medicine in an email.
New strains are constantly emerging, and this one is not cause for alarm, Reiser said. He added that the new strain of norovirus is similar to other common stomach “bugs,” but cautioned that patients do remain contagious for a few days or even weeks after they recover from the illness.
Transmission typically occurs through food, though occasionally waterborne, and the virus is capable of surviving without a host for hours at a time, which may explain its prevalence on cruise ships, in restaurants and on college campuses via contaminated foods and liquids.
But rather than making panicked trips to the ER, students should instead visit the closest water fountain — the strongest defense against a norovirus infection is hydration, Reiser said.
For those who wish to avoid contracting the virus in the first place, though, “good hand washing is the best prevention,” Reiser said, noting a New York Times-reviewed study that found alcohol-based hand sanitizers were less effective at eliminating the virus.
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