Ciência Rural (Dec 1997)
Avaliação de métodos de controle da infecção pelo vírus da leucose enzoótica bovina Appraisal methods for controlling the infection by enzootic bovine leukosis
Abstract
Foram avaliadas três alternativas de controle da infecção pelo vírus da Leucose Bovina: a) eliminação dos animais soropositivos: b) segregação dos animais soropositivos: c) manejo misto dos animais, com adoção de medidas recomendadas para evitar a transmissão do vírus. O primeiro teste sorológico realizado em oito propriedades leiteiras revelou a presença da infecção com índices que variaram entre 2,5% (1/40) e 58,1% (18/31). Duas propriedades com baixo nível de infecção inicial (Three procedures for the control of bovine leukemia vírus infection (BLV) were evaluated: a) elimination of seropositive animals: b) segregation of animals into seropositive and seronegative groups: c) combined management and use of strict procedures to minimize viral transmission. The first serological testing in eight dairy farms demonstrated a prevalence ranging of 2.5% (1/40) to 58.1% (18/31). Two farms with a low prevalence (<10%) decided to cull the seropositive animals. In one of these farms, the culting of positive animals resulted in eradication of the infection, demonstrated by the absence of seropositive reactors in the following tests. In the second farm, where the only seropositive animal was kept in the herd, the incidence reached 20% (3/15) in a six months period. The culling of the reactors in farms with low levels of infection seemed to be the most efficient procedure for eradication the infection. Segregation of reactors and negative animals into two groups was adopted in one farm, where only one animal seroconverted during the experiment, resulting in an incidence of 4.5% (1/22). The farms where a combined management was adopted presented a incidence ranging between 2.6% (1/38) and 50% (4/8). These resulls suggested that this procedure woutd require a longer period of observation in order to evaluate its efficacy. It has been possible to obtain seronegative offspring from positive dams when a substitutive or heat-inactivated milk was used. The reduction of the level of infection in a herd, without immediately culling the infected animals may be possible by replacing older animais with heifers bom in the samefarm.
Keywords
