Press information

February 16, 2004

Swedish Juvenile Diabetes Foundation supports Ljungan virus research

- Ljungan virus as the possible etiologic agent of juvenile diabetes

The Swedish Juvenile Diabetes Foundation, “Barndiabetesfonden”, supports research about the association between the Ljungan virus and juvenile diabetes.

“It is of great value to have the support of the Swedish Juvenile Diabetes Foundation. More research is needed to investigate the possible association between Ljungan virus and juvenile diabetes,” says Bo Niklasson, Research Director of Apodemus.

The Ljungan virus was originally found among bank voles and scientists have recently discovered that infected voles also develop diabetes. A significant association has also been established between the number of voles in the wild and the number of children falling ill with diabetes. Tests run in collaboration between Astrid Lindgren Children’s Hospital, the University of Washington in Seattle and Apodemus have established that children that have recently fallen ill with diabetes carry antibodies against the Ljungan virus, considerably more often than healthy control children.

The research of Ljungan Virus and juvenile diabetes goes on through a collaboration project between Apodemus AB, Drs Bengt Persson and Eva Örtqvist at Astrid Lindgren Children's Hospital and Gun Forsander at Queen Silvia Children's Hospital in Sweden. The project named “The Ljungan virus as cause of type 1 diabetes among humans” has now received SEK 60,000 from the Swedish Juvenile Diabetes Foundation.

For further information, please contact:
Bo Niklasson, Research Director at Apodemus AB, +46 708 23 23 23, bo.niklasson@apodemus.se

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The research company Apodemus AB hypothesise that several chronic diseases may be caused by a virus, the Ljungan virus, which is transmitted from animals to humans. The Ljungan virus is carried by bank voles, the most common mammal in Scandinavia.