A case of acute hepatitis E in Mie prefecture infected with genotype 4 hepatitis E virus strain endemic in Aichi and Shizuoka prefectures (Aichi/Shizuoka strain), without a history of eating wild animal meat

We experienced a case of hepatitis E in Mie prefecture infected with genotype 4 hepatitis E virus (HEV) strain endemic in Aichi and Shizuoka prefectures (Aichi/Shizuoka strain). The HEV isolate obtained from the patient clustered with other Aichi/Shizuoka strains with 100% of bootstrap value in the phylogenetic tree, and was more than 97.8% identical to other Aichi/Shizuoka strains, in the 412-nucleotide sequence within the ORF2 region. Interestingly, the patient had no history of consuming wild animal meat although all other reported Aichi/Shizuoka strains were recovered from meat from wild animals or humans after eating wild animal meat. The finding indicated that the origin of Aichi/Shizuoka strains is confined not only to wild animal meat but also to other unknown reservoirs.