Less than 10% of people develop severe neurologic, central nervous system, and hemorrhagic symptoms, such as purpura, epitasis, hallucinations, disorientation, convulsions, and life-threatening epistaxis.
[1][5] Elevated liver enzymes, leukopenia, proteinuria and thrombocytopenia, which leads to hemorrhagic fever and encephalitis (which can result in death), have been found in hospitalized patients.
Laboratory diagnosis of ALKV can be performed in the early stages of the illness by molecular detection of PCR or virus isolation from the blood.
[13] The route of transmission for ALKV is not fully understood and is filled with huge knowledge gaps, though camels and sheep have been linked to be the natural hosts of this virus.
[16] The geographic distribution of the virus has extended beyond Saudi Arabia; reports of ALKV have been documented in countries where there is no endemic vector of the disease, such as Egypt, Djibouti, and India.
[17][1] As a response to the troubling illness, the KSA (Kingdom of Saudi Arabia) is treating ALKV as one of the nationally notifiable diseases in the country.
[19][20] This virus[21] was first isolated from the blood of a 32-year-old male butcher at Dr. Soliman Fakeeh Hospital, Saudi Arabia during the 1990s, who became sick with an acute, fatal hemorrhagic fever after slaughtering a sheep imported from the small city of A Khurmah, Mecca province.