Absence of Heat Intolerance (Panting) Syndrome in Foot-and-Mouth Disease-Affected Indian Cattle (Bos indicus) is Associated with Intact Thyroid Gland Function

Abstract

Foot-and-mouth disease (FMD) is a highly contagious and economically important viral disease with high morbidity and reduced productivity of affected animals. We studied the heat intolerance (HI) (panting) syndrome and the effect of FMD virus (FMDV) infection on thyroid gland function in Indian cattle (Bos indicus). Experimental infection with FMDV Asia 1 resulted in a mild form of disease with superficial lesions. Heat intolerance syndrome and its signs were not observed among the recovered animals. Subtle changes in the serum level of thyroid hormones, triiodothyronine (T₃) and thyroxine (T₄) were observed. However, there were no distinct histological changes in the thyroid gland, and FMDV antigens were not detected in the thyroid tissues. Our results thus suggest that the absence of panting syndrome in FMD-affected Bos indicus cattle may be associated with intact thyroid gland function.

Short communication: preliminary observations on the serum levels of HSP70 and its correlation with serum cortisol, thyroid hormones, and acute-phase protein concentration in cattle naturally infected with foot-and-mouth disease virus

“…It has been further postulated that FMD viral infection interferes with the hypothalamic-pituitary-thyroid axis (Artz et al 2011). Few researchers have investigated thyroid functionality during experimental FMD (Maddur et al 2011;Saravanan et al 2020); however, serum T3/T4 levels following natural FMD infection in cattle are still largely unknown.…”