Disease Information
Researcher at work in BSL-4 laboratory.
The Viral Special Pathogens Branch works with Biosafety Level 4 (BSL-4) viruses. These viruses are highly pathogenic and require handling in special laboratory facilities designed to contain them.
Our mission focuses mainly on viral hemorrhagic fevers (VHFs), such as Ebola hemorrhagic fever, Lassa fever, hantavirus pulmonary syndrome (HPS), and hemorrhagic fever with renal syndrome (HFRS). Our work also includes the study of other emerging viral disease agents that do not cause hemorrhagic fever, but require BSL-4 handling, such as Nipah virus and tick-borne encephalitis virus.
All of the viruses we work with are zoonotic (animal-borne), lipid-enveloped RNA viruses. Some of them are rare, whereas others are quite common and cause frequently debilitating or fatal disease in many thousands of people. Some of the virus types are found in relatively small geographic areas, others are distributed over continents. If you were to draw a map showing where these viruses were found collectively, your map would cover most of the inhabited regions of the globe.
For more general information on VHFs, please refer to our Viral Hemorrhagic Fevers Fact Sheet.
Table of Virus Families and Diseases
The following is a table of the diseases/agents that are presently the focus of our work activities. Currently, only some virus family and disease fact sheets are available on-line.
