The Lumpy Skin Disease

The Lumpy Skin Disease was initially found in an outbreak in Zambia in 1929.
The Lumpy Skin Disease is caused by the LSD virus (LSDV), a poxvirus of the genus capripoxvirus.
The studies indicate that until the 1980’s the virus was widely confined to African Continent until it was found in Israel in 1989.
And in the recent years Lumpy Skin Disease is being reported all over the world especially China, India, Nepal, Bhutan, Vietnam, Hong Kong and Myanmar.

Suspected cases of LSD were observed in Odisha in August 2019, the first laboratory-confirmed outbreak of LSD was subsequently reported in November 2019.
Sequences of particular genes of the isolated virus from the 2019 outbreak were genetically similar to strains from Kenya.
Large outbreak of LSD was reported from Gujarat and Rajasthan in July 2022, which subsequently spread to 11 other States with over 80,000 cattle deaths.

Department of Animal Husbandry in Rajasthan in association with CSIR Institute of Genomics and Integrative Biology(CSIR – IGIB) has reported the whole genome sequences of six isolates of LSDV collected from five affected animals.
From the report it could be inferred that there were almost 177 unique mutations when compared to those that was found in Kenya.
It is interesting to know that out of these 177 mutations, 47 were found to be not present in any other global genome sequences of LSDV.

As the world is gearing up towards a holistic concept of ‘One Health’, viruses like this may disrupt the entire ecosystem.
As the recent experience from the Covid-19 pandemic clearly highlights the urgent need of adopting towards One Health.
Food security is a key factor in nurturing the human resource, so agriculture plays a huge role in the world from which the cattle cannot be separated.
With newer and better tools like molecular surveillance and digital technologies to identify and stop emerging pathogens, the world must gear up towards it.

Source The Hindu

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