Abstract
Eight dairy flocks, comprising a total of 323 indigenous Passirian goats from northern Italy, were examined to determine the seroprevalence and clinical incidence of small ruminant lentivirus (SRLV) infections and to identify the SRLV subtypes. The seroprevalence was 81.5% (55–95%). The clinical incidence was 2.5% (0–8.3%) and was apparently low due to the practice of culling clinically affected animals. Phylogenetic analysis of eight PCR fragments (one sample from each flock) revealed that all proviruses belonged to the SRLV subtype B1, which suggests a common source of infection. Subtype B1 being the only circulating SRLV, coupled with the fact that mixed herd systems are very rare in South Tyrol, gives hope that an eradication programme in goats can be successful even without including sheep as long as sheep are kept strictly and permanently isolated.
References
Adams DS, Klevjer-Anderson P, Carlson JL, McGuire TC, Gorham JR (1983) Transmission and control of caprine arthritis-encephalitis virus. Am J Vet Res 44:1670–1675
Felsenstein J (1985) Confidence limits on phylogenies: an approach using bootstrap. Evolution 39:783–791
Gufler H (2004) CAEV: clinical and serological findings and the economical losses in a goat herd of “Passeirer Goat”. Tierärztl Prax 32:263–268
Gufler H, Zambotto P, Bonizzi L, Lombardo D (2005) CAEV: preliminary results of an alternative scheme for CAE-control in a goat herd of Passirian Goat. Tierärztl Prax 33:162–168
Gufler H, Zambotto P, Baumgartner W (2007) Goat population and risk factors associated with caprine arthritis encephalitis infection in Northern Italy. Wien Tierärztl Monatsschr 94:48–52
Gufler H, Gasteiner J, Stifter E, Lombardo D, Krassnig R, Baumgartner W (2007) Serological study of small ruminant lentivirus in goats in Italy. Small Rumin Res 73:169–173
Kumar S, Tamura K, Jakobsen IB, Nei M (2001) MEGA2: molecular evolutionary genetics analysis software. Bioinformatics 17:1244–1245
Leroux C, Chastang J, Greenland T, Mornex JF (1997) Genomic heterogeneity of small ruminant lentiviruses: existence of heterogeneous populations in sheep and of the same lentiviral genotypes in sheep and goats. Arch Virol 142:1125–1137
Peterhans E, Greenland T, Badiola J, Harkiss G, Bertoni G, Amorena B, Eliaszewicz M, Juste RA, Kraßnig R, Lafont JP, Lenihan P, Petursson G, Pritchard G, Thorley J, Vitu C, Mornex JF, Pepin M (2004) Routes of transmission and consequences of small ruminant lentiviruses (SRLVs) infection and eradication schemes. Vet Res 35:257–274
Pisoni G, Quasso A, Moroni P (2005) Phylogenetic analysis of small-ruminant lentivirus subtype B1 in mixed flocks: evidence for natural transmission from goats to sheep. Virology 339:147–152
Pisoni G, Bertoni G, Boettcher P, Ponti W, Moroni P (2006) Phylogenetic analysis of the gag region encoding the matrix protein of small ruminant lentiviruses: comparative analysis and molecular epidemiological applications. Virus Res 116:159–167
Rowe JD, East NE (1997) Risk factors for transmission and methods for control of caprine arthritis-encephalitis virus infection. Vet Clin North Am Food Anim Pract 13:35–53
Saltarelli M, Querat G, Konings DA, Vigne R, Clements JE (1990) Nucleotide sequence and transcriptional analysis of molecular clones of CAEV which generate infectious virus. Virology 179:347–364
Shah CA, Böni J, Huder JB, Vogt HR, Mühlherr J, Zanoni R, Miserez R, Lutz H, Schüpbach J (2004) Phylogenetic analysis and reclassification of caprine and ovine lentiviruses based on 104 new isolates: evidence for regular sheep-to-goat transmission and world-wide propagation through livestock trade. Virology 319:12–26
Tamura K, Nei M (1993) Estimation of the number of nucleotide substitutions in the control region of mitochondrial DNA in humans and chimpanzees. Mol Biol Evol 10:512–526
Thompson JD, Higgins DG, Gibson TJ (1994) Molecular epidemiology of HIV-1 variants in the global AIDS pandemic: an update. AIDS Rev 7:210–224
Zanoni R (1998) Phylogenetic analysis of small ruminant lentiviruses. J Genet Virol 79:1951–1961
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Gufler, H., Moroni, P., Casu, S. et al. Seroprevalence, clinical incidence, and molecular and epidemiological characterisation of small ruminant lentivirus in the indigenous Passirian goat in northern Italy. Arch Virol 153, 1581–1585 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00705-008-0136-4
Received:
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00705-008-0136-4