Emerging Infectious Diseases (Jun 2009)

Merkel Cell Polyomavirus Strains in Patients with Merkel Cell Carcinoma

  • Antoine Touzé,
  • Julien Gaitan,
  • Annabel Maruani,
  • Emmanuelle Le Bidre,
  • Angélique Doussinaud,
  • Christine Clavel,
  • Anne Durlach,
  • François Aubin,
  • Serge Guyétant,
  • Gérard Lorette,
  • Pierre Coursaget

DOI
https://doi.org/10.3201/eid1506.081463
Journal volume & issue
Vol. 15, no. 6
pp. 960 – 962

Abstract

Read online

We investigated whether Merkel cell carcinoma (MCC) patients in France carry Merkel cell polyomavirus (MCPyV) and then identified strain variations. All frozen MCC specimens and 45% of formalin-fixed and paraffin-embedded specimens, but none of the non-MCC neuroendocrine carcinomas specimens, had MCPyV. Strains from France and the United States were similar.

Keywords