Virus World

Exposure to viral infections in the brain during childhood has been linked to an increased risk of developing multiple sclerosis later in life.

 

Multiple sclerosis is the most common auto-immune disease affecting the brain. Up to date, there is still neither a cure available nor a clear understanding of the factors that trigger this disease at around 30 years of age. “We asked ourselves whether brain viral infections that could be contracted in early childhood were among the possible causes,” says Doron Merkler, a professor in the Department of Pathology and Immunology in UNIGE’s Faculty of Medicine and senior consultant in the Clinical Pathology Service of the HUG. Such transient brain infections can be controlled quickly by the immune system, without the affected individual even noticing any symptoms. “But these transient infections may, under certain circumstances, leave a local footprint, an inflammatory signature, in the brain,” continues the researcher.