Bovine Viral Diarrhea Virus Diagnosis, Management, and Control

tion been used in addition to the serological testing. In the other herd with a false negative result, a single persistently infected calf of 3 months of age was missed. This animal was reported not to have had contact with the target population. The authors noted that the overall sensitivity of the serologic evaluation of five unvaccinated heifers for determining herds with persistently infected cattle could be improved by periodic retesting of herds that had negative results. The use and testing of sentinel animals in vaccinated herds has been recommended as an important element of a BVDV control program (Dubovi, 2002).

CONTROL BY VACCINATION

In recent years there have been two major trends in vaccine research and development: the inclusion of BVDV 2 strains in commercial vaccines and the evaluation of the efficacy of BVDV vaccines for protection against fetal infection. The latter, an assessment of efficacy for fetal protection, has not been a requirement for the licensing of vaccines in the U.S. and Canada. For licensing, the vaccines are required only to show protection against acute infections. However, in recent years, efforts by both individual researchers and vaccine companies have been intensified to evaluate BVDV vaccines for their efficacy in providing fetal protection. The ability to demonstrate and claim vaccine efficacy for fetal protection should give those vaccine companies a competitive advantage over others that cannot make such a claim for their products. This will be the driving force for new and better products in the absence of new regulations.

Recently, experiments involving immunization with BVDV-specific nucleic acids (DNA or RNA) have been performed. The first of these utilized a recombinant plasmid containing the BVDV E2 gene with a human cytomegalovirus promotor for DNA immunization of mice (Harpin et al., 1997). Neutralizing responses against BVDV 1 strains were generated, which persisted for 6 months after the last injection. In cattle, immunization with the plasmid produced both a neutralizing antibody response and a cellular immune response, but immunization was only partially protective when the cattle were inoculated with a challenge virus (Harpin et al., 1999).

Vassilev et al. (2001) used full-length, infectious BVDV RNA derived from a recombinant, infectious cDNA clone (NADL strain) to immunize cattle and sheep against BVDV. The RNA was coated onto gold microcarrier particles and delivered to the inoc-

ulation sites using a gene gun delivery system. Serumneutralizing antibody titers of >212 and >27 were generated in calves to the NADL strain of BVDV 1 and to a BVDV 2 strain, respectively.

Muñoz-Zanzi et al. (2002) developed models to predict the age of dairy calves when colostrumderived BVDV antibodies would decline to a level that would no longer offer disease protection or interfere with vaccination. The ages at which 50% of the calves were predicted to have low antibody titers (<1:16) were, for two herds, 107–111 days for BVDV 1 and 75–81 days for BVDV 2. The ages at which 50% of the calves were predicted to be seronegative (titer <1:8) were, for the same herds, 139–143 days for BVDV 1 and 110–118 days for BVDV 2. These ages were considerably shorter than earlier estimates for the persistence of colostral antibodies (6–10 months). The differences in these estimates may be due, in part, to the large sample size (466 calves) used in this study or due to differences in protocols for administering colostrum.

ERADICATION

The eradication programs without vaccination that began in the 1990s in the Scandinavian countries have proven to be very successful in reducing the number of herds with BVDV infections. For instance, 52% of herds were estimated to be infected in Sweden in 1993, whereas in 2002, 93% of dairy and 88% of beef herds were considered BVDV-free (Lindberg, 2002). Eradication of BVDV appears to have been even more successful in Denmark where, in 2002, approximately 99% of dairy and 98% of beef herds were free of BVDV (Bitsch et al., 2002).

In Germany, an ongoing control program for eventual BVDV eradication is voluntary and partially subsidized by the state (Greiser-Wilke, 2002). Vaccination is practiced in Germany to reduce virus circulation and to minimize economic losses. A killed vaccine is used for basic immunization and an attenuated live virus vaccine is used to booster the immune response. Screening for removal of persistently infected animals is performed using an antigen capture ELISA. If all animals up to 3 years of age in a herd are negative, the herd is classified as “BVDV unsuspicious.”

In 2002, the Academy of Veterinary Consultants (AVC), presented a position statement on BVDV for eventual eradication of the virus in North America at a USDA-sponsored meeting (Grotelueschen, 2002). The AVC, established in 1970, is an association of veterinarians involved in beef cattle medicine, herd health programs, and consultation. Its members con-

sist of veterinarians from both the U.S. and Canada. The BVDV position statement reads:

The beef and dairy industries suffer enormous loss due to effects of bovine viral diarrhea virus (BVDV) infection. The highly mutable nature of BVDV and the emergence of highly virulent strains of BVDV contribute to limited success of present control programs. Also persistently infected cattle are the primary source of infection and effective testing procedures are available to identify those infected carriers. Therefore, it is the resolve of the Academy of Veterinary Consultants that the beef and dairy industries adopt measures to control and target eventual eradication of BVDV from North America.

The AVC position statement is likely only a first step toward a more comprehensive program against BVDV in North America, and the support of producer groups will be critical before such a program becomes a reality. The consensus of those present was that any eradication program in North America will likely include vaccination, and that vaccines that provide maximum fetal protection will be crucial to the success of this type of program.

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INTRODUCTION

Many biological variables can be used to quantify the occurrence of bovine virus diarrhea virus (BVDV) infections, including clinical, pathological, virological, serological, and production measures. The importance of each measure depends on the purpose of the investigation. In surveillance and eradication programs, the laboratory diagnoses are important to document where the infection is present or was present recently; from an economic point of view it is important to combine virological and serological measures with information on clinical and production variables; and from an animal welfare point of view the emphasis would be on the severity of the clinical signs. However, it is not always possible to fully describe the occurrence of a disease for all purposes, simply because of the variations in the quality of the data.

For BVDV infections, good quality data are available from many parts of the world on the presence of persistently infected (PI) animals and antibody carriers in addition to epidemiological data on the occurrence of infection. However, when it comes to the disease (clinical signs and reduced production due to BVDV infections), the data are often based on selected cases, making it difficult to estimate the true occurrence of the disease in a population. Therefore, the calculation of the economic effect of infection is often based on the proportion of infected animals that are estimated to have suffered from the disease, which are hereafter included in economical models. Also the importance of risk factors is usually related to the occurrence of infection rather than that of the disease. This chapter outlines the occurrence of BVDV infections, the associated risk factors for infection and the effect of infections on disease and production including financial losses.

MEASURABLE AND QUANTIFIABLE

EPIDEMIOLOGICAL VARIABLES

The relevant variables for describing the occurrence of BVDV infection include the detection of virus and/or antibodies in the animal as well as data related to disease and reduced production following infection. In addition, the occurrence of BVDV should be described in relation to risk factors that can be host-, agent-, or environment-related. This chapter emphasizes risk factors for determining the occurrence and distribution of BVDV. An epidemiological framework for the necessary data for describing BVDV occurrence is given in Figure 2.1. Here the variables are divided into risk factors on the one hand and measurable output variables on the other. The list of epidemiological data in Figure 2.1 is not exhaustive, but the boxes in the figure refer to the following subchapters where more detailed information is given.

There are two important mathematical measures of disease occurrence (or disease frequency): prevalence and incidence. The prevalence is a measure of what is present here and now, whereas incidence measures the occurrence of new cases over time. Both measures are useful in describing BVDV infections. The occurrence of long-lasting antibodies (often lifelong) and the lifelong presence of virus in PI animals make prevalence studies more suitable for BVDV infections than is the case for many other infections. Prevalence and incidence can be applied both to individual animals as well as herds. However, the definition of a herd infection may often be more uncertain and more complicated than at the individual animal level.