Genetic Characterization of Foot and Mouth Disease Virus Serotype A Circulating in Eastern Egypt

Currently, three serotypes of Foot-and-Mouth Disease virus (FMDV), A, O and SAT2 were circulating among different provinces of Egypt. The study was planned to isolate and characterize FMDV type A from recent outbreaks in 4 governorates of Egypt (Ismailia, Suez, Sharkia and Port Said) in order to formulate an effective control strategies. A total of 82 pooled tongue epithelia and vesicular fluids samples were collected from cattle and buffaloes in the period of March 2013 to December 2014. Thirty nine and twenty nine pooled samples showed positive to FMDV type A when examined by RT-PCR and ELISA respectively. A total of 48 pooled samples showed FMDV like CPE when isolated and propagated in BHK21 cell culture and then identified by VNT and confirmed by PCR. The samples give a suspected bands at 600 bp when PCR products examined by agarose gel electrophoresis. PCR products of three isolates were selected for nucleotide sequencing representing 2 cattle from Suez, Sharkia and one buffalo from Port Said. When the VP1 sequence of the current strains compared to other strains circulates in the middle east region of Asian and Egyptian topotypes submitted to gene bank showed a close relation to FMDV-A Iran 5-2006 and FMDV-A Iran 53-2005, with identity percentages ranged between 94.9 and 97.1 %, indicating that the FMDV type A virus circulating in the area of study may evolved from the FMDV circulating in Iran (FMDV-A Iran 53-2005).