Molecular epidemiology of Japanese Encephalitis Virus in pig population of Odisha, Assam and Manipur states of India

Japanese encephalitis virus (JEV) comes under the family Flaviviridae and genus flavivirus. It predominantly infects the children under the age of 10 years and the case fatality rate can stretch out as high as 30%. Pigs act as reservoir and amplifying intermediate host for JEV. Recent report suggested longer persistence of JEV in tonsil than in circulation of experimentally infected pigs. The current investigation was conducted to understand the prevalence and molecular epidemiology of JEV infection in pigs in three different geographical sites in India (Odisha, Assam and Manipur). Serum samples were tested by ELISA and RT-PCR for detection of JEV, while only RT-PCR was done in case of tonsils tissues collected from pigs slaughtered in abattoir. Prevalence of JEV was highest in Manipur (25.45% in serum and 10.08% in tonsil) but lower in Assam (3.75% in serum and 0% in tonsils) and Odisha (1.49% in serum and 3.7% in tonsils). The percentage of sero-positivity was found to be 3.75% of IgM and 9.9% of IgG in Assam and Odisha respectively. Genotype III (GIII) of JEV was the dominant genotype and sporadic mutations of S83G, H76P, E78Q, C55S, and S64W along with two consistent mutations V46S and V51I were observed in all the GIII strains. Analysis of the E gene sequence revealed a single mutation, S118N in the GI strain. Older pigs (above 7 months) were found to be infected relatively more (8.6%) than younger pigs (age group 3-7 months). In conclusion, the high JE virus infection rate of pig in the current locations suggests the need for continuous surveillance of this virus in pigs which will ultimately help to adopt an effective control strategy to prevent the spread of JE infection to human.\n\nAuthor summaryJapanese encephalitis is one of the contributing factors in acute encephalitis syndrome cases reported across India as well as Asia. Primarily young naive human population are affected with JEV. The death rate can be as high as 30% and in about 30%-50% surviving population paralysis, brain damage or other serious permanent sequelae may be observed. The viral load gets amplified in pigs and thus plays a crucial role in transmitting the infection in human communities living in close proximity to pig dwelling. The current study was conducted to demonstrate prevalence of JEV in pig population of three geographical regions of India viz. the States of Odisha, Assam and Manipur that have reported JE outbreaks in human population. The current study demonstrates that the rate of infection is 3.28% among pigs in Manipur followed by Assam and Odisha. GIII was found to be the most predominant JEV genotype, while only one GI genotype strain was detected from Odisha region. These findings suggested the need of continuous surveillance of this virus in pigs and proper implementation of human and animal vaccination programme to control the infection.