Chikungunya virus (CHIKV) is an alphavirus of the Togaviridae family that causes chronic and incapacitating arthralgia in human populations. Since its discovery in 1952, CHIKV was responsible for sporadic and infrequent outbreaks. However, since 2005, global Chikungunya outbreaks have occurred, inducing some fatalities and associated with severe and chronic morbidity. Chikungunya is thus considered as an important re-emerging public health problem in both tropical and temperate countries, where the distribution of the Aedes mosquito vectors continues to expand. This review highlights the most recent advances in our knowledge and understanding of the epidemiology, biology, treatment and vaccination strategies of CHIKV.
Chikungunya virus (CHIKV) is an Aedes-borne alphavirus, historically found in Africa and Asia, where it caused sporadic outbreaks. In 2004, CHIKV reemerged in East Africa and spread globally to cause epidemics, including, for the first time, autochthonous transmission in Europe, the Middle East, and Oceania. The epidemic strains were of the East/Central/South African genotype. Strains of the Asian genotype of CHIKV continued to cause outbreaks in Asia and spread to Oceania and, in 2013, to the Americas. Acute disease, mainly comprising fever, rash, and arthralgia, was previously regarded as self-limiting; however, there is growing evidence of severe but rare manifestations, such as neurological disease. Furthermore, CHIKV appears to cause a significant burden of long-term morbidity due to persistent arthralgia. Diagnostic assays have advanced greatly in recent years, although there remains a need for simple, accurate, and affordable tests for the developing countries where CHIKV is most prevalent. This review focuses on recent important work on the epidemiology, clinical disease and diagnostics of CHIKV.
Currently, there are no licensed vaccines or therapies available against chikungunya virus (CHIKV), and these were subjects discussed during a CHIKV meeting recently organized in Langkawi, Malaysia. In this review, we chart the approaches taken in both areas. Because of a sharp increase in new data in these fields, the present paper is complementary to previous reviews by Weaver et al. in 2012 and Kaur and Chu in 2013 . The most promising antivirals so far discovered are reviewed, with a special focus on the virus-encoded replication proteins as potential targets. Within the vaccines in development, our review emphasizes the various strategies in parallel development that are unique in the vaccine field against a single disease.