‘Social distancing’ could tackle maedi-visna

A lack of social distancing between sheep is almost exclusively to blame for the spread of the virus that causes maedi-visna, according to new research.

Scientists from the University of Edinburgh, the Moredun Research Institute and GD Animal Health in The Netherlands found much higher rates of virus spread during periods of winter housing than between sheep kept at grass.

“The striking result from our research is that MV is a disease of housing,” said Dr Nick Savill and Prof Andrew Illius, who jointly led the research from the University of Edinburgh.

“Even brief periods of housing allow it to spread, but transmission of the virus is negligible between sheep kept at grass. So although individual sheep never recover from the disease, it could be eliminated from flocks over time by exploiting the fact that transmission of the virus is too slow between grazing sheep to sustain the disease.”

Another key finding of the research was that maternal transmission from ewes to lambs has only a small effect on disease spread. Lambs from infected ewes have a low probability of being infected directly by them, and only a small proportion of ewe lambs need be retained to maintain flock size.

Additionally, the disease is unlikely to be spread by newly-infected animals, researchers say. The time between an animal being infected and becoming infectious is estimated to be about a year, which is consistent with the slow and progressive emergence of symptoms of MV.

An incurable and eventually fatal disease in sheep, MV is mostly transmitted via exhaled droplets and aerosols from infected sheep, suggesting the danger of prolonged close contact, such as during housing. However, there has been no previous quantitative analysis of virus transmission under farm conditions.

The most common symptoms are chronic respiratory disease and hardening of the udder, which only become evident some years after infection.

Dr Tom McNeilly from Moredun Research Institute said the study answers simple but highly important questions about how MV is transmitted between sheep and how to prevent it.

“Our results show that transmission occurs almost exclusively during housing and points towards simple and practical methods to reduce transmission within the flock.”

Dr Karianne Lievaart-Peterson from GD Animal Health in the Netherlands added: “If sheep are prevented from ‘social distancing’ in cases such as (winter) housing, transport, penning for selection or treatment purposes, there is an increased risk of spreading MV infection.”

Future work will identify the most effective ways to test for the virus in order to clear infections from the flock and investigate cheap and practical methods to control the disease, such as keeping ewes of different age-groups in separate pens when housed.