Little known, this intestinal virus contaminates 2 million people each year in France (it is found in salad)

An expensive lunch. In her podcast MeSsy, Christina Applegate, actress-star of the series “Married, Two Children” and “Dead to Me” admitted to having contracted an intestinal virus, after consuming a contaminated salad in a vegetarian restaurant that she has been frequenting for 15 years . “I was so sick I couldn’t eat anymore. I could not do anything […] I even had to wear adult diapers“, confides the 52-year-old actress to her listeners. Little known, this virus is nevertheless responsible for 8% of cases of acute gastroenteritis, which represents around 2 million people in France alone.

This intestinal virus is a close relative of norovirus, the most common cause of gastroenteritis. It generally affects children, less so adults. In most cases, it causes few or no symptoms in healthy people. At most, digestive symptoms last a short week. On the other hand, it is more aggressive in people who are immunocompromised or in fragile health (the actress has suffered from multiple sclerosis since 2021 and had contracted Covid-19 a few weeks before her infection, editor’s note) and causes significant diarrhea which can last up to 20 days, but less vomiting than a norovirus infection. Other constitutional symptoms, such as nausea, stomach/abdominal cramps, chills, headache, myalgia, or feeling unwell are also commonly reported. The incubation period is relatively rapid and varies between less than a day and 4 days.

The virus in question is called the “sapovirus”, so named because it was responsible for a large epidemic in Sapporo, Japan in 1982. This contagious virus is spread by the fecal-oral route, which means that people are infected by accidentally ingesting fecal matter contaminated with the virus. This usually happens when a person drinks or eats something that has been contaminated – usually raw vegetables or poorly cleaned salad – but can also occur through contact with a sick person. As the clinical symptoms of sapovirus gastroenteritis are indistinguishable from those caused by noroviruses, laboratory diagnosis is therefore essential to identify the pathogen. There is no vaccine or antiviral treatment available to protect against or treat sapovirus. Since diarrhea increases the risk of dehydration, the doctor often prescribes electrolytes or oral nutritional supplements. The only way to protect yourself is to wash your hands frequently with soap and water and to wash raw fruits and vegetables well in clean water before preparing and eating them.