Abstract
Two of the most important diseases of cattle are caused by mycoplasmas. Mycoplasma bovis is a world-wide bovine pathogen that can cause pneumonia, mastitis and arthritis. It has now spread to most, if not all, cattle-rearing countries. Due to its increasing resistance to antimicrobial therapy, vaccination is the principal focus of the control of infection, but effective vaccines are currently lacking. Despite being eradicated from most parts of the world, Mycoplasma mycoides subsp. mycoides, the cause of contagious bovine pleuropneumonia (CBPP), continues to plague sub-Saharan Africa, affecting at least 25 countries. Numerous new experimental vaccines have been developed over the last 20 years to improve on protection afforded by the T1/44, a live vaccine in continuous use in Africa for over 60 years, but none so far have succeeded; indeed, many have exacerbated the disease. Tools for diagnosis and control are adequate for eradication but what is necessary are resources to improve vaccine coverage to levels last seen in the 1970s, when CBPP was restricted to a few countries in Africa. This paper summarizes the results of the main studies in the field of experimental mycoplasma vaccines, reviews data on commercially available bacterin vaccines and addresses issues relating to the search for new candidates for effective vaccines to reduce economic losses in the cattle industry caused by these two mycoplasmas.
Highlights
M. bovis is the etiological agent of many disorders in cattle with different clinical manifestations, such as pneumonia, mastitis, arthritis, otitis, keratoconjunctivitis, endocarditis and brain disorders [3]
It is known that M. bovis is able to evade the host immune system most of all due to high antigenic variability of the strains, its intracellular persistence in both phagocytic and non-phagocytic cells and the immune response modulation by the bacteria [6,7,8,9]
Due to the increasing resistance of European field strains to most antimicrobials with the exception, so far, of the fluoroquinolones, and overall difficulties in M. bovis therapy, the only principal strategy for control of these infections is the use of effective vaccines [10,11]
Summary
Publisher’s Note: MDPI stays neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations. Contagious bovine pleuropneumonia (CBPP), one the great historic plagues of cattle alongside the eradicated rinderpest, continues to inflict serious losses on livestock in many parts of sub-Saharan Africa [13]. CBPP is a severe pneumonia of cattle caused by the wall-less bacterium Mycoplasma mycoides subspecies mycoides. It was recognized very early on that the slaughter of affected and contact animals with strict movement restrictions could effectively control the disease [15]. The difficulty, is identifying affected animals quickly enough to prevent the disease spreading because, though the lung may be very severely damaged, clinical signs are often lacking [16]; this was true in outbreaks in European herds where cattle remain housed throughout the year. Africa where animals endure a much more hostile environment, leading to higher morbidity and mortality rates than in European cattle
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