Pet Hamster Linked to Deaths of Three Organ Transplant Patients

A pet hamster has been linked with the deaths of three organ transplant patients who contracted a virus commonly found in rodents.

The victims, and a fourth patient who was exposed to the virus but survived, all received organs from a female donor from Rhode Island who died of unrelated causes.

Officials said at least one pet in the woman's home, a hamster bought at a local pet shop, tested positive for lymphocytic choriomeningitis, a virus associated with rodent waste.

Health officials are also trying to trace two people who received corneas from the infected organ donor in operations done outside the US.

The dead were a liver transplant recipient, a double lung recipient and a kidney transplant beneficiary. They died a few weeks after receiving the organs in mid April. The virus also killed the hamster.

It emerged yesterday that the virus may also have caused the deaths of four other transplant patients, in Wisconsin during 2003.

The virus is commonly found in house mice but usually produces only flu-like symptoms in humans. It has also been linked with neurological illness and miscarriages.

The patients are thought to have died because they received large doses of medication to suppress their immune systems, allowing the virus to grow. But officials have urged transplant patients not to panic, describing the deaths as "an extremely rare and unusual event". Dave Daigle, a spokesman for the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention, said: "We can't rule out a common house mouse."