Fatal Case of Enterovirus 71 Infection and Rituximab Therapy, France, 2012

Fatal Case of Enterovirus 71 Infection and Rituximab Therapy, France, 2012To the Editor: Enterovirus 71 (EV-71) causes primarily asymptomatic or benign infections in children <5 years of age.However, it may cause severe and sometimes fatal neurologic complications, such as brainstem encephalitis and polio-like paralysis (1).Over the last 15 years, large outbreaks of EV-71 infection have been described in the Asia-Pacific region, associated with the regular emergence of new genetic lineages (2).Since the 1978 outbreak in Hungary, rare sporadic cases have been reported in Europe (1).In France, during 2000-2009, a total of 81 hospitalized patients with EV-17 infection were reported by the sentinel surveillance system, including 2 child deaths, 1 due to proven rhombencephalitis (3,4).We report here a fatal case of EV-71 rhombencephalitis in an immuno-

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