Limited Persistence of Virus in Congenital Rubella

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Abstract
RUBELLA virus has been demonstrated to persist in the nasopharynx of children with congenital defects for at least a number of months.1,2These children also actively produce rubella neutralizing antibody.3,4The virus has been isolated from many tissues of infants dying with congenital rubella at 1 to 3 months of age.5Several recent studies have shown that the infected children are also infectious and pose a hazard to personnel working with these patients.6,7The present study was conducted to determine if virus persists in the nasopharynx of older children and young adults with rubella syndrome defects, and if neutralizing or complement fixing antibody is present in the sera of these patients. Materials and Methods Sixteen institutionalized children and young adults were selected for the study. The average age of these patients was 14 years with a range of 5 to 22 years. All of the patients