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HealthDay News — The first human case of a strain of hepatitis E previously found only in rats was diagnosed in a Hong Kong man who received a liver transplant in May 2017.
University of Hong Kong researchers said the 56-year-old man was cured of the liver disease in March, The New York Times reported. The case is “a wake-up call,” according to Yuen Kwok-yung, M.D., chairman of the infectious diseases section of the microbiology department at the university.
The rat strain of hepatitis E was discovered in 2010 in Germany and has been found in rats across the world, including in the United States, according to the university researchers.