Abstract
BackgroundAleutian mink disease has major economic consequences on the mink farming industry worldwide, as it causes a disease that affects both the fur quality and the health and welfare of the mink. The virus causing this disease is a single-stranded DNA virus of the genus Amdoparvovirus belonging to the family of Parvoviridae. In Denmark, infection with AMDV has largely been restricted to a region in the northern part of the country since 2001, affecting only 5% of the total Danish mink farms. However, in 2015 outbreaks of AMDV were diagnosed in all parts of the country. Initial analyses revealed that the out breaks were caused by two different strains of AMDV that were significant different from the circulating Danish strains. To track the source of these outbreaks, a major investigation of global AMDV strains was initiated.MethodsSamples from 13 different countries were collected and partial NS1 gene was sequenced and subjected to phylogenetic analyses.ResultsThe analyses revealed that AMDV exhibited substantial genetic diversity. No clear country wise clustering was evident, but exchange of viruses between countries was revealed. One of the Danish outbreaks was caused by a strain of AMDV that closely resembled a strain originating from Sweden. In contrast, we did not identify any potential source for the other and more widespread outbreak strain.ConclusionTo the authors knowledge this is the first major global phylogenetic study of contemporary AMDV partial NS1 sequences. The study proved that partial NS1 sequencing can be used to distinguish virus strains belonging to major clusters. The partial NS1 sequencing can therefore be a helpful tool in combination with epidemiological data, in relation to outbreak tracking. However detailed information on farm to farm transmission requires full genome sequencing.
Highlights
Aleutian mink disease has major economic consequences on the mink farming industry worldwide, as it causes a disease that affects both the fur quality and the health and welfare of the mink
The pairwise sequence identity when comparing the aligned partial Nonstructural protein 1 (NS1) sequences ranged from 78% to 100% corresponding to between 0 and 73 differing nucleotide positions
The phylogenetic analysis demonstrated substantial genetic diversity among the sequences collected within each country and within farms, and confirmed results from previous studies of Aleutian mink disease virus (AMDV) diversity based on the partial NS1 gene [6, 10,11,12, 18, 19]
Summary
Aleutian mink disease has major economic consequences on the mink farming industry worldwide, as it causes a disease that affects both the fur quality and the health and welfare of the mink The virus causing this disease is a single-stranded DNA virus of the genus Amdoparvovirus belonging to the family of Parvoviridae. In 1976, Denmark initiated a voluntary control program and in 1999 legislation was implemented to make all farms test their breeders for the purpose of establishing the disease status of the farm This eradication program resulted in only 5% of Danish farms being positive for AMDV in 2001, with all positive farms being restricted to one specific region in the northern part of the Jutland peninsula. In 2015, outbreaks of AMDV appeared affecting all regions of Denmark with unknown source
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