Neurological disorder in cattle associated with bovine herpesvirus 4

Abstract

A nested PCR assay was used to diagnose bovine encephalitis through herpesviruses including bovine herpesvirus 5 (BHV-5), bovine herpesvirus 1 (BHV-1), Aujeszky's disease virus (SHV-1), and ovine herpesvirus 2 (OHV-2) in 14 fragments of central nervous system (CNS) from cattle that died with neurological signs. In addition, as some samples of bovine herpesvirus type 4 (BHV-4) have been isolated from neural tissue, it was also tested by nested PCR. The cases of encephalitis occurred in isolation at different times of the year and did not present any seasonality. The duration of the clinical course ranged between 1 to 15 days, and in 64.3% of the cases it manifested between 1 to 2 days. The most frequently observed neurological signs were ataxia, recumbency, unsteadiness and inability to stand, opisthotonus, paddling movements, nystagmus and ptyalism. In the nested assay, there was no evidence of: BHV-1, SHV-1 or OHV-2 in the DNA obtained from the CNS in any of the samples. But the presence of BHV-4 was found in all fragments of the CNS in cattle which died presenting neurological signs. Moreover, BHV-5 was found in association with BHV-4 in two of these samples.Keywords: cattle, bovine herpesvirus 4, central nervous system, encephalitis RESUMO Nested PCR foi utilizada para o diagnóstico de encefalite bovina por herpesvírus incluindo o herpesvírus bovino 5 (BHV-5), o herpesvírus bovino 1 (BHV-1), o vírus da doença de Aujeszky (SHV-1) e o herpesvírus ovino 2 (OHV-2) em 14 fragmentos do sistema nervoso central (SNC) de bovinos que morreram com sinais neurológicos. Embora o BHV-4 não seja reconhecido como vírus neurotrófico, foi detectado nos casos de

Detection of bovine herpesvirus 2 and bovine herpesvirus 4 DNA in trigeminal ganglia of naturally infected cattle by polymerase chain reaction

“…Interestingly, two of the BoHV-4 positive animals were concurrently positive for BoHV-5 DNA, indicating the coexistence of both DNA viruses in fragments of CNS (Costa et al, 2011). In the United States, a seroprevalence of 36% (107/296) was detected for BoHV-4 infection in one dairy herd (Frazier et al, 2002), while in Canada, the prevalence of anti-BoHV-4 antibodies in milk samples of 176 tested cows was 98.2%, but PCR positive results were only 1.3% (Ali et al, 2011).…”

Impact of Bovine Herpesvirus 4 (BoHV-4) on Reproduction

“…BoHV-4 has been found to be associated with a variety of conditions: peritonitis, infertility, abortion, metritis, vulvovaginitis, but also orchitis, mastitis, diarrhoea (in association with Cryptosporidium), sudden death in neonates, pneumonia and ocular signs in calves, encephalitis, cutaneous lesions, synovitis, digital dermatitis (Bartha et al, 1966;Castrucci et al, 1987;VanOpdenbosch et al, 1988;Costa et al, 2011). But the virus has also been isolated from healthy animals (Frazier et al, 2002;Monge et al, 2006).…”

Prevalence of Bovine herpesvirus type 4 in aborting dairy cows

“…BHV-4 is related to many different conditions: infertility, postpartal metritis, abortion, vulvovaginitis, mastitis, encephalitis, calf pneumonia, keratoconjunctivitis, Correspondence to: -D. Cvetojević, e-mail: jaffvet@gmail.com; tel. : +381 11 285 10 65 cutaneous lesions, digital dermatitis (Castrucci et al 1986, Wellenberg et al 2000, Monge et al 2006, Costa et al 2011, Chastant-Maillard 2015. Beside that, the virus may also be isolated from clinically healthy animals (Frazier et al 2001).…”