Review on Lumpy Skin Disease Virus Characteristics and its Diagnosis in Cattle

Abstract

Lumpy skin disease is characterized by its signs including eruptive, infectious and occasionally causing death to affected animals. It is caused by the family Poxviridea and genus Capripox with a strain of Neethling virus, a double stranded DNA virus. LSD clinical signs are mainly observed on skin as nodules (0.5 to 5 cm in diameter) throughout the skin surface or subcutaneous tissue involving superficial lymph nodes. Diagnosis of CaPV is based upon clinical signs with laboratory confirmation by virus isolation, polymerase chain reaction (PCR) and electron microscopy. Field diagnosis of LSD is often based on characteristic clinical signs of the disease. However, mild and subclinical forms require rapid and reliable laboratory testing to confirm diagnosis. Isolation of virus can be made from collected biopsy or at post-mortem from skin nodules, lung lesions or lymph nodes within the first week of the occurrence of clinical signs, before the development of neutralizing antibodies. There are different methods to detect LSD virus antibody from blood samples. These are serum neutralization test (SNT), indirect fluorescent antibody test (IFAT) and enzyme-linked immune-sorbent assay. LSD as a member of CaPVs, it has a single serotype, do not cause persistent infection, have a limited host range and vaccines are available that may provide long term immunity. These attributes increase the prospect of successfully implementing regional control programs, leading to the elimination of the virus and conceivably global eradication.