See text Enterovirus is a genus of positive-sense single-stranded RNA viruses associated with several human and mammalian diseases.

[1] Serologic studies have distinguished 71 human enterovirus serotypes on the basis of antibody neutralization tests.

Enteroviruses isolated more recently are named with a system of consecutive numbers: EV-D68, EV-B69, EV-D70, EV-A71, etc., where genotyping is based on the VP1 capsid region.

[2] Enteroviruses affect millions of people worldwide each year and are often found in the respiratory secretions (e.g., saliva, sputum, or nasal mucus) and stool of an infected person.

All enteroviruses contain a genome of approximately 7,500 bases and are known to have a high mutation rate due to low-fidelity replication and frequent recombination.

[5] RNA recombination appears to be a major driving force in the evolution of enteroviruses as well as in the shaping of their genetic architecture.

Interestingly, the enterovirus species EV-A, EV-B, EV-C, EV-D have not been observed so far to exchange genomic regions among them, with the exception of the 5'UTR.

[citation needed]Coxsackie A16 virus causes human hand, foot and mouth disease.

The Coxsackie B viruses are also reported to cause a spastic paralysis due to the degeneration of neuronal tissue and muscle injury.

Infections usually occur during warm summer months with symptoms including exanthema, pleurodynia, flu-like illness consisting of fever, fatigue, malaise, myalgia, nausea, abdominal pain and vomiting.

[12] Echoviruses are a cause of many of the nonspecific viral infections that can range from minor illness to severe, potentially fatal conditions such as aseptic meningitis, encephalitis, paralysis and myocarditis.

They have been reported to remain in the body causing persistent infections contributing to chronic diseases such as type I diabetes.

PV-1 is the most common type to cause infection in humans; however, all three forms are extremely contagious spreading through person-to-person contact.

[17][18] However, genomic mutations which enterovirus B serotypes (such as coxsackievirus B and echovirus) may acquire in the host during the acute phase of the infection can transform these viruses into the non-cytolytic form (also known as non-cytopathic or defective enterovirus), a form which is capable of causing persistent low-level infections in human tissues that can last indefinitely.

[19] This persistent non-cytolytic enterovirus is a mutated quasispecies,[17] and such non-cytolytic infections have been found in the pancreas in type 1 diabetes,[20][21] in chronic myocarditis and dilated cardiomyopathy,[22][17][23] in valvular heart disease,[24] in the muscles, intestines and brain in myalgic encephalomyelitis,[25][26] and in Sjögren's syndrome.

Enteroviruses can cause anything from rashes in small children, to summer colds, to encephalitis, to blurred vision, to pericarditis.

[57] A team working at University of Tampere, Finland identified the enterovirus Coxsackievirus B1 as possibly linked to type 1 diabetes (which is an autoimmune disease).

More intense symptoms of enterovirus include hypoxia, aseptic meningitis, conjunctivitis, hand, foot and mouth disease, and paralysis.