Disease Course of Korean African Swine Fever Virus in Domestic Pigs Exposed Intraorally, Intranasally, Intramuscularly, and by Direct Contact with Infected Pigs

• Published in: Viruses Vol. 16; no. 3; p. 433
• Main Authors: Cho, Ki-Hyun, Hong, Seong-Keun, Kim, Da-Young, Sohn, Hyun-Joo, Yoo, Dae-Sung, Kang, Hae-Eun, Kim, Yeon-Hee
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Switzerland MDPI AG 01.03.2024; MDPI
• Subjects: African Swine Fever; African Swine Fever Virus; animal experiment; Animals; comparison; Development and progression; Diarrhea; disease course; Distribution; Domestic animals; Epidemics; Euthanasia; Experiments; Genomes; Genotype & phenotype; Hogs; Immunization; Infections; Infectious diseases; inoculation routes; Laboratories; Latent period; Lymph nodes; Lymphatic system; Pathogenicity; Republic of Korea; Risk factors; Spleen; Sus scrofa; Swine; Vaccine development; Vaccine efficacy; Vaccines; Virulence; Viruses; Republic of Korea; South Korea; Asia; United States > US; Europe; China; Africa; Italy; Georgia; Germany; Russia; North Korea; comparison; African swine fever; disease course; inoculation routes; animal experiment
• ISSN: 1999-4915; 1999-4915
• DOI: 10.3390/v16030433

African swine fever (ASF) is a fatal contagious disease affecting swine. The first Korean ASF virus (ASFV) isolate (Korea/Pig/Paju1/2019) was used to compare the disease course of ASFV in pigs inoculated via the four routes. In the challenge experiment, domestic pigs were infected via the intraoral (IO) and intranasal (IN) routes with a 10 50% hemadsorbing dose (HAD ) and an intramuscular (IM) injection of 10 HAD . In the direct contact (DC) group, five naïve pigs were brought into direct contact with two IM-ASFV-infected pigs. IO-, IN-, and IM-inoculated pigs showed similar disease courses, whereas DC pigs had comparable ASF syndrome after a 7-day latent period. The disease course in the DC route, one of the most common routes of infection, was not significantly different from that in the IO and IN routes. IM and DC groups differed in terms of the severity of fever and hemorrhagic lesions in the lymph nodes and spleen, indicating that the IM route, suitable for early vaccine development trials, is not appropriate for studying the ASFV infection mechanism, including early stage of infection, and IO and IN challenges with a designated dose can be alternatives in trials for assessing ASFV pathogenicity and vaccine efficacy investigations.