Inefficient transmission of African swine fever virus to sentinel pigs from environmental contamination under experimental conditions

Abstract

Knowledge about African swine fever virus (ASFV) transmission and its survival in the environment is mandatory to develop rational control strategies and combat this serious disease in pigs. In this study, the risk that environmental contamination poses for infection of naive pigs was investigated. Naive pigs were introduced as sentinels into contaminated pens either on the same day or up to three days after ASFV-infected pigs were removed. Three experiments were carried out in which four to six pigs per pen were inoculated with virulent ASFV isolates OURT88/1 (genotype I), Georgia 2007/1 or POL/2015/Podlaskie (genotype II), respectively. The majority of the inoculated pigs developed acute disease but with no evident haemorrhagic lesions or haemorrhagic diarrhoea and were culled at the predefined humane endpoint. The levels of ASFV DNA detected in the blood of the infected animals reached 107-9 genome copies/ml before euthanasia. Environmental swabs were taken from different surfaces in the animal rooms, as well as from faeces and urine, close to the time of introduction of the naive animals. Relatively low quantities of virus DNA were detected in the environmental samples, in the order of 103-7 genome copies. Neither clinical signs nor virus genomes were detected in the blood of any of the sentinel pigs over a period of two to three weeks after exposure, indicating that transmission from the ASFV-contaminated environment did not occur. Interestingly, viral DNA was detected in nasal and oral swabs from some of the sentinel animals at early days of exposure (ranging between 103.7-5.8 genome copies), though none of them developed ASF. The results indicate a relatively low risk of ASFV transmission from a contaminated environment in the absence of blood from infected animals.