Abstract
Lyssaviruses are an important genus of zoonotic viruses which cause the disease rabies. The United Kingdom is free of classical rabies (RABV). However, bat rabies due to European bat lyssavirus 2 (EBLV-2), has been detected in Daubenton’s bats (Myotis daubentonii) in Great Britain since 1996, including a fatal human case in Scotland in 2002. Across Europe, European bat lyssavirus 1 (EBLV-1) is commonly associated with serotine bats (Eptesicus serotinus). Despite the presence of serotine bats across large parts of southern England, EBLV-1 had not previously been detected in this population. However, in 2018, EBLV-1 was detected through passive surveillance in a serotine bat from Dorset, England, using a combination of fluorescent antibody test, reverse transcription-PCR, Sanger sequencing and immunohistochemical analysis. Subsequent EBLV-1 positive serotine bats have been identified in South West England, again through passive surveillance, during 2018, 2019 and 2020. Here, we confirm details of seven cases of EBLV-1 and present similarities in genetic sequence indicating that emergence of EBLV-1 is likely to be recent, potentially associated with the natural movement of bats from the near continent
Highlights
Naïve animal populations, including those of wild bat species, without previous exposure to infectious novel pathogens may show little resistance to infection or transmission of disease [1,2,3,4]
The seven lyssavirus positive bats were diagnosed using a suite of diagnostic assays to detect lyssavirus antigen using fluorescent antibody test (FAT), and lyssavirus viral RNA using a pan-lyssavirus SYBR real-time room temperature (RT)-PCR
European bat lyssavirus 1 (EBLV-1) was confirmed as the lyssavirus species using a differential TaqMan real-time RT-PCR (Table 1) and by sequencing the amplicons generated by a pan-lyssavirus hnRTPCR
Summary
Naïve animal populations, including those of wild bat species, without previous exposure to infectious novel pathogens may show little resistance to infection or transmission of disease [1,2,3,4]. Focal cases in vulnerable populations might facilitate incursions, and these, if able to spread may result in epidemic outbreaks or endemic diseases. Where these emergent diseases are zoonotic and become established in animal populations, they can have serious repercussions for human health [5,6,7]. Members of the closely related European bat lyssaviruses (EBLV), which cause fatal rabies encephalitis, do circulate in the UK and mainland Europe [9,10]. In the UK, European bat lyssavirus 2 (EBLV-2) is endemic in Daubenton’s bats (Myotis daubentonii) and has been detected regularly since
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