Seroprevalence of Epizootic Hemorrhagic Disease Virus in Cattle, Sheep, and Goats in New York State From 2022 Through 2025.

Authors

Elisha Frye, Patrick Connelly, Krysten Schuler, Jennifer Powers, Melissa Aprea, Diego G Diel

Published in

Transboundary and emerging diseases. Volume 2026. Issue 1. Pages e5552390.

Abstract

Epizootic hemorrhagic disease (EHD) virus (EHDV) is a vector-borne virus transmitted by Culicoides midges that infects domestic and wild ruminants. EHDV causes high mortality in white-tailed deer (WTD) and oral lesions mimicking foot and mouth disease (FMD) in cattle. Small ruminants (e.g., domestic sheep, domestic goats) seroconvert but do not typically develop disease. In 2021, ~2100 WTD deaths were attributed to EHD in New York (NY) State. That same year, an EHD outbreak at a NY dairy resulted in a foreign animal disease (FAD) investigation to rule out FMD, and EHDV was detected in a captive bison herd in NY. In response to the EHD outbreak affecting wildlife, agricultural, and exhibition animals, serum samples from cattle, sheep, and goats submitted to the Cornell University College of Veterinary Medicine Animal Health Diagnostic Center (AHDC) were tested for EHDV antibodies. The samples tested in our surveillance study included samples collected during and after Culicoides vector activity (July-January) over three seasons from 2022 to 2025. A total of 5698 samples comprising 4874 cattle and 824 small ruminants were tested using the agar gel immunodiffusion assay (AGID). Season 1 had 0.6% seroprevalence (10/1719), season 2 had 0.7% seroprevalence (15/2021), season 3 had 0.5% seroprevalence (9/1958) with an overall seroprevalence of 0.6%. Neutralizing antibody (NA) titers were determined on all AGID positive samples for EHDV serotypes 1, 2, and 6. There were 20 samples positive for EHDV serotype 2 (NA titers from 1:40 to ≥ 1:1280); 11 samples positive for EHDV serotype 6 (NA titers from 1:10 to 1:640); and three animals with cross-reaction amongst serotypes. Of the 34 positive samples, 31 were from cattle and 3 were from sheep. Nineteen samples were from counties with large numbers of WTD deaths attributed to EHDV in 2021 or counties with cases of EHDV in cattle. This data indicates that EHDV serotypes 2 and 6 subclinically infected a small number of domestic ruminants in NY from 2022 to 2025.

PMID:
42803757
Bibliographic data and abstract were imported from PubMed on 28 Sep 2026.

Read full publication at:
Please sign in to see all details.

Stats

1-terrible, 9-excellent. How would you rate this publication? Sign in in to submit your rating.

Post a comment

You need to be signed in to post comments. You can sign in here.

Comments

There are no comments yet.