Detection of Japanese encephalitis virus and its specific antibody in abnormal swine litters in Vietnam

Japanese encephalitis is considered an essential disease-causing swine reproductive failure in Asian countries; however, significant knowledge gaps remain about this problem in actual cases. This study examined 55 cases of reproductive failure in sows, including one abortion and 54 full-term farrowing litters, to find the Japanese encephalitis virus (JEV) and specific antibodies against JEV. Haemagglutination test was used to detect specific antibodies against JEV from 63 samples of fetal thoracic fluids and newborn un-suckling piglet sera (54 thoracic fluid samples of dead fetuses, two thoracic fluid samples of abortion fetuses, seven sera samples of weakly newborn un-suckling piglets), viral isolation and RT- PCR technique was attempted from 60 brains of fetuses and newborn un-suckling piglets, histopathology sections of fetal brains which were positive with JEV confirmed by HI test and RT-PCR were also made. The results showed that 17.46% (11/63) of thoracic fluids and sera were positive for JEV. No JEV isolation was found from 60 brain samples of dead fetuses and piglets, but RNA of JEV were detected from 5 of them (8.33%). Our results suggest that JEV should be considered the important cause of swine reproductive failure in Viet Nam

Prevalence of Marek’s disease virus in unvaccinated healthy backyard chickens in Cantho city, Vietnam and genetic characterization of meq gene

An investigation was carried out to survey the prevalence of Marek’s disease virus serotype 1 (MDV-1) on unvaccinated healthy backyard chicken flocks from four districts in Cantho city and to analyze the genetic characterization of the meq gene. A total of 353 feather follicle samples were collected from 50 unvaccinated chicken flocks for Marek’s disease to investigate prevalent MDV-1 by polymerase chain reaction (PCR). The four represent strains were chosen for meq gene sequencing. The results revealed that 26 out of 353 samples were positive for MDV-1 accounting for 7.37%. There were significant differences in the prevalence of MDV-1 on chickens among districts (P<0.05). The Meq protein of the four strains (VT, CD, PD, and TL) contained 20.14% proline and three regions of proline repeats. Besides, all four strains occurred with amino acid point mutations. These strains had only a substitution of proline at position 217 as well as interruption of consecutive proline at site 2. Phylogenetic analysis indicated that these strains were within a group relating to virulent Italian isolates