Experimental Swinepox in Gnotobiotic Piglets

Abstract

Summary Virus obtained from a naturally-occurring case of swinepox in Illinois was transmitted to 14--day-old germ-free (GF) piglets. Virus was isolated from the infected piglets in diploid swine cell cultures, but was not readily demonstrable in these cells until the fifth blind passage. Once adapted to cell cultures the agent grew well and was easily re-isolated in cell cultures after passage in GF pigs. Lesions characteristic of sivinepox were produced in GF piglets both with the field and cell culture adapted virus. Attempts to cultivate the field and cell culture adapted strains in rabbits, HeLa cell cultures, and 10-day-old chick embryos were unsuccessful. The agent appears to be highly host specific, is not neutralized by vaccinia antiserum, and is probably similar to, if not identical with, an agent(s) reported in Ohio and Iowa.