Pathological investigation and viral antigen distribution of emerging African swine fever in Vietnam

Abstract

African swine fever (ASF) is emerging in Vietnam and poses a continuing severe threat to the swine industry. A histopathological study of clinical samples collected during the May to July 2019 outbreak of ASF was performed to determine the characteristic lesions. We analysed samples from eight ASFV-infected farms. Histopathological results revealed the characteristic lesions of the acute to the subacute clinical form of ASF. Immunohistochemical results showed ASFV viral antigen distribution in mononuclear cells/macrophage in various organs, hepatocytes and renal tubular epithelium. Molecular analysis of partial capsid protein 72 gene revealed that ASFV strain from the eight separate outbreaks belonged to genotype II.