High prevalence of human bocavirus 1 in infants with lower acute respiratory tract disease in Argentina, 2007 - 2009

human bocavirus (hbov) is a parvovirus whose association with respiratory disease is currently under investigation. objective: to determine hbov prevalence in children with lower acute respiratory infection. methods: we investigated hbov in 433 nasopharyngeal aspirates collected in 2007-2009 from children 0 to 5 years old hospitalized with bronchiolitis or pneumonia in córdoba, argentina. results: the general prevalence of hbov was 21.5% and the positive cases (hbov+) were more frequent during winter and spring. the mean age of hbov+ patients was 6.9 months, with 87.1% of the detections corresponding to infants less than 1 year old (among which the prevalence of hbov was 26.3% in patients < 3 months of age, 22.1% in 3 to 6 months, 25.3% in 6 to 9 months, and 18.8% in 9 to 12 months). the sequence analysis of the np1 coding region of 15 isolates showed that all isolates from cordoba were hbov1 which exhibited a homology of nearly 100% both among themselves and with the originally discovered virus from 2005. conclusion: overall, our results indicate that hbov is a significant pathogen that contributes to acute respiratory infection both on its own and during coinfection with other viruses.