Emergence of Foot and mouth disease virus, Lib 12 lineage of topotype VII, serotype SAT2 in Egypt, 2018.

Foot and mouth disease (FMD) is a highly contagious and sometimes fatal viral disease of cloven footed animals. The disease exhibits overwhelming economic impacts and has been caused by seven antigenically distinct foot and mouth disease virus (FMDV) serotypes; O, A, C, Asia1, SAT1, SAT2 and SAT3, all belonging to genus Aphthovirus, Family picornaviradae. Further genetic analysis of viral protein 1 (VP1 gene) classifies the strains within each serotype into topotypes, lineages and/ or genotypes; this classification is important for studying virus molecular epidemiology and tracing the source of newly emerging strains. During 2018, many farm owners and veterinarian in Egypt complained from FMDV outbreaks. The disease was severe in buffalo in comparison to cattle. Therefore, Oral epithelium samples were collected from acutely infected animals in different governorates; the total RNA was extracted and tested by two-step real time (rt) RT-PCR, targeting the highly conserved 3D region of FMDV for the detection and relative quantification of the virus. Samples containing high viral load were tested by a panel of serotype specific primers to amplify the full length of VP1 region by RT-PCR. The amplicons were sequenced and analyzed for genetic characterization. Interestingly, most of tested samples by RT-PCR were positive for serotype SAT2 and phylogenetic analysis of 11 samples showed the clustering of characterized strains in topotype VII, Lib12 lineage. Therefore, this strain may have been introduced to Egypt from Libya. Outbreaks are still reported all over the country and Egyptian veterinary authorities responded by starting an emergency vaccination campaigns using a locally produced monovalent vaccine containing this exotic strain. To our knowledge, this is the first report describing the circulation of this exotic lineage in Egypt. This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved.