There’s never been a better reason to wash your hands, and wash them often, as America enters the 2007 cold and flu season with cause for concern. Amid rising cases of everything from sexually-transmitted diseases to drug-resistent staph infections, comes word of an uncommon and sometimes deadly strain of the cold virus spreading throughout the country that has killed 10 people and hospitalized at least 53 in the last year and a half.

Adenovirus serotype 14 (Ad14), as it’s called, causes severe and even fatal respiratory illness in people of all ages. The U. S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports it has sickened more than 360 people in Texas, Oregon, Washington and New York. More than 100 cases of the adenovirus were found in a breakout of respiratory illness among military trainees at Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio, Texas, that left one dead.

The CDC says Ad14 is a new strain of an old virus first isolated in 1955, and advises state and local health professionals to be on the alert for further outbreaks.

Photo Credit: CDC/Betty G. Partin

Adenoviruses come in 51 distinct types, causing everything from conjuctivitis and bronchitis to a range of gastrointestinal problems. Most infections run their course without need for medical treatment.