Orf virus infection in Alaskan mountain goats, Dall’s sheep, muskoxen, caribou and Sitka black-tailed deer

Abstract

BackgroundThe zoonotic Orf virus (ORFV; genus Parapoxvirus, Poxviridae family) occurs worldwide and is transmitted between sheep and goats, wildlife and man. Archived tissue samples from 16 Alaskan wildlife cases, representing mountain goat (Oreamnos americanus, n = 8), Dall’s sheep (Ovis dalli dalli, n = 3), muskox (Ovibos moschatus, n = 3), Sitka black-tailed deer (Odocoileus hemionus sitkensis, n = 1) and caribou (Rangifer tarandus granti, n = 1), were analyzed.ResultsClinical signs and pathology were most severe in mountain goats, affecting most mucocutaneous regions, including palpebrae, nares, lips, anus, prepuce or vulva, as well as coronary bands. The proliferative masses were solid and nodular, covered by dark friable crusts. For Dall’s sheep lambs and juveniles, the gross lesions were similar to those of mountain goats, but not as extensive. The muskoxen displayed ulcerative lesions on the legs. The caribou had two ulcerative lesions on the upper lip, as well as lesions on the distal part of the legs, around the main and dew claws. A large hairless spherical mass, with the characteristics of a fibroma, was sampled from a Sitka black-tailed deer, which did not show proliferative lesions typical of an ORFV infection. Polymerase chain reaction analyses for B2L, GIF, vIL-10 and ATI demonstrated ORFV specific DNA in all cases. Sequences from Dall’s sheep formed a separate cluster, comparable to ORFV from domestic sheep. Sequences from the other species were different from the Dall’s sheep sequences, but almost identical to each other.ConclusionsThis is the first major investigation of parapoxvirus infections in large Alaskan game species, and the first report of parapoxvirus infection in caribou and Sitka black-tailed deer. This study shows that most of the wild ruminant species in Alaska and from most parts of Alaska, can carry and be affected by ORFV. These findings call for attention to transmission of ORFV from wildlife to livestock and to hunters, subsistence harvesters, and wildlife biologists.Electronic supplementary materialThe online version of this article (10.1186/s13028-018-0366-8) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

Epitheliotropic Infections in Wildlife Ruminants From the Central Alps and Stelvio National Park

“…The mechanism of inter species transmission of CePV1v should be studied further in the light of the fact that other Delta papillomaviruses have already shown to be transmissible even to phylogenetically distant animal species thus host tropism of papillomaviruses is not as species-specific as previously thought (22). The genetic characterization of the PPV infecting chamois and ibex suggested that OV has an ecological niche in chamois and ibex as reported for other wildlife species worldwide (39). Nevertheless, phylogenetic analysis of the conserved B2L gene showed that all strains of chamois and ibex grouped with other isolates from sheep and goats instead of clustering by animal species confirming the high genomic variability of the OV species and the susceptibility of wildlife species.…”

Detection and Phylogenetic Analysis of B2L Gene of ORF Virus from Clinical Cases of Sheep in Serbia

“…The diagnosis is often based on clinical signs and characteristic tissue alterations in affected animals. The clinical features found in infected animals vary from multiple lesions around the lips, muzzle, nostrils, teats and oral mucosa, with occasional spread to the buccal cavity, oesophagus, stomach, intestine or the respiratory tract (Nandi et al, 2011;Maganga et al, 2016;Tryland et al, 2018). Despite very developed characteristic clinical symptoms, and in order to exclude other contagious diseases, two suspect ORF infections that were reported in 2016 were confirmed in the laboratory by the virus isolation, PCR, and genome sequencing.…”

“…Sheep and goats are most susceptible for ORFV infection, but the other ruminants such as musk ox, camels and reindeer can be infected (Mombeni et al, 2013;Tryland et al, 2018). ORFV has also zoonotic potential affecting people who work with animals (Zhang et al, 2014b;Bergqvist et al, 2017).…”

Post-Translational Protein Deimination Signatures in Plasma and Plasma EVs of Reindeer (Rangifer tarandus)

“…Further viruses include papillomaviruses, parvovirus, and polyomavirus, as well as importantly also Coronaviridae [ 131 ]. Experimental viral infections in reindeer include herpesvirus 2 and parapoxvirus, both of which have though also been detected in Norwegian reindeer [ 129 ], including semi-domesticated reindeer [ 132 ] as well as in Alaskan caribou and other wildlife, and are known to be transmitted between wildlife, sheep, goats and human [ 5 ].…”

“…The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species (2016) has classified reindeer as a vulnerable species due to a decline of individuals, possibly attributed to habitat shift and/or their susceptibility to chronic wasting disease (CWD), a fatal neurodegenerative disorder [ 3 , 4 ]. Importantly also, R. tarandus may play roles in various zoonotic diseases, including parasitic, bacterial and viral ones [ 5 , 6 , 7 , 8 ], and deer have furthermore been recently identified to be new reservoir hosts for SARS-CoV-2 [ 9 ].…”