Authors
Shuting Yang, Jian Gao, Lijiao Cao, Hailong Zhang, Lina Ren, Ziping Miao, Qing Zhang, Xiangyu Kong, Guoyong Mei, Lingli Sun, Shuaifeng Zhou, Miao Jin
Published in
BMC infectious diseases. Jul 20, 2026. Epub Jul 20, 2026.
Abstract
Noroviruses is a major cause of outbreaks and sporadic acute gastroenteritis (AGE) across all age groups. Although the GII.4 norovirus has been the primary cause of most AGE outbreaks, Non-GII.4 norovirus has been reported globally.
We aimed to report an increase in GII.17 norovirus outbreaks of acute gastroenteritis in multiple provinces of China during the second half of 2024.
Data and specimens from AGE outbreaks (January 2022-December 2024) were collected. Samples were tested via real-time RT-PCR; positive GII.17[P17] samples underwent sequencing and phylogenetic analysis.
Among 1,579 norovirus outbreaks, 1,225 were genotyped. The first halves of 2022-2024 saw co-circulation of genotypes GII.3[P12], GII.4 Sydney, GII.17[P17], and GII.7[P7]. GII.4 Sydney dominated the second halves of 2022 (46.15%) and 2023 (51.63%). Strikingly, in the second half of 2024, GII.17[P17] became predominant, causing 75.28% of outbreaks. This shift was driven by a novel GII.17 variant (Romania-2021 like, subcluster C2), first detected in February 2024, which replaced the previous Kawasaki 308-like variant. The novel variant predominantly affected the 6-18 years age group (54.97%) and elementary schools (34.33%). Relative to Cluster D, this novel variant harbors five amino acid mutations in antigenic epitopes, one mutation in the histo-blood group antigen (HBGA) binding site, and two deletions.
A novel GII.17 variant has overtaken GII.4 as the predominant norovirus strain in China since late 2024, underscoring the need for continued molecular surveillance.
PMID:
42477554
Bibliographic data and abstract were imported from PubMed on 21 Jul 2026.
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