Outbreak of acute hemorrhagic conjunctivitis due to coxsackie A24 variant--Taiwan.

Outbreaks of acute hemorrhagic conjunctivitis caused by enterovirus 70 and several serotypes of adenovirus have occurred in Taiwan since 1971. In 1980-1981, there was a pandemic of acute hemorrhagic conjunctivitis in southeast Asia caused by coxsackie A24 variant (CA24v); however, this virus did not affect Taiwan. In October 1985, CA24v was isolated for the first time from patients with acute hemorrhagic conjunctivitis in southern Taiwan. The following summer, a large epidemic of acute hemorrhagic conjunctivitis due to CA24v occurred. An epidemiologic investigation of patients seen at one ophthalmology clinic in Taipei City revealed that school-age children were the most likely group to introduce illness into households (p less than 0.001) and that males were more often household index cases than were females (p less than 0.01). Multiple case households tended to be more crowded (3.0 vs. 2.5 persons per bathroom; p less than 0.05) and had illness introduced by younger family members (median age of index case = 10 vs. 17 years; p less than 0.01). It is unknown whether this outbreak is an isolated occurrence or represents another resurgence of CA24v in the area.