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Seven representative isolates from six outbreaks of acute haemorrhagic conjunctivitis were shown to have the characteristics of enteroviruses. Two viruses differed from the remaining five isolates in producing paralysis in suckling mice and being resistant to 2-hydroxybenzyl-benzimidazole. These two viruses were also closely related antigenically and distinct from the other five viruses which were serologically similar to each other. Neither group of viruses was inhibited by antisera to the known enteroviruses and they probably represent two new enterovirus types one related to the Coxsackie A viruses and the other to the echoviruses. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

In two epidemics of acute enterovirus conjunctivitis the diagnosis could only be established by the use of human embryonic organ cultures. In one instance cultures of ciliated respiratory epithelium proved sensitive to the virus but similar culture failed to support growth of the virus from the second outbreak which was isolated in organ cultures of conjunctiva. The virus associated with a third outbreak had previously been isolated from the original material by culture in human embryo kidney cells, but it required passage in organ culture for its detection after the specimens had been diluted. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]