Microbial Causes of Mental Retardation the Role of Prenatal Infections With Cytomegalovirus, Rubella Virus, and Toxoplasma

Increased Risk for Developmental Disabilities in Children Who Have Major Birth Defects: A Population-Based Study

“…tions between MR and congenital TORCH infections (PR ϭ 24.3) 30 and between MR and fetal alcohol syndrome (PR ϭ 29.1). 31 The high prevalence of MR (PR ϭ 23.3) in children with defects classified as "other syndromes" (ICD-9, 759.6, 759.8) confirms previous clinical case reports of such associations.…”

Toxoplasmosis

“…Through a series of computations from the data of others, Hume concluded that toxoplasmosis is the cause of impairment in at least 4% of the population composed of the "mentally retarded and [those with] cerebral dysfunction" [416]. Interpretation of many of these studies, and those by workers who found little or no significant difference between mentally retarded and control populations [363,383,[417][418][419][420][421], is complicated by the high prevalence of acquired Toxoplasma infection among control subjects, which may mask the possible role of congenital toxoplasmosis in mental retardation (and other sequelae of encephalopathy, such as convulsions). For example, if the proportion of cases of mental retardation is small and the prevalence of T. gondii antibody titers in the control population is high, it is not possible with presently available diagnostic techniques to distinguish those cases in which T. gondii is the cause of mental retardation.…”

An Ultrastructural Investigation of Cytomegalovirus Replication in Murine Hepatocytes

“…In man they may be responsible for congenital and neonatal infections (Stern et al, 1969;Reynolds et al, 1973Reynolds et al, , 1974, a variety of clinical syndromes in children and adults (Diosi & Rosin, 1965;Klemola & K~ifirifiinen, 1965;Carter, 1968;Henson, 1969;Klemola et al, 1969;Craighead, 1971;Weller, 1971a, b), acquired immune deficiency (Duwall et al, 1966;Rinaldo et al, 1980;Drew et al, 1981 ;Mildvan et al, 1982), and may complicate organ transplantation (Craighead et al, 1967;Spencer, 1974) and" open heart surgery (Kfi~iri~tinen et al, 1966;Lang et al, 1968;Caul et al, 1971).…”