Ingestion of low doses of deoxynivalenol does not affect hematological, biochemical, or immune responses of piglets.

Deoxynivalenol (DON), a mycotoxin produced by Fusarium spp., is a frequent contaminant of cereals. Because of their rich cereal diet, pigs could be exposed to this mycotoxin. Pigs are among the animal species showing the greatest sensitivity to DON. Effects of intermediate to high levels of DON on pigs are well known and include feed refusal, decreased feed intake, and alteration of the immune response. Effects of low levels of DON, which are commonly detected in contaminated feed, remain unknown. The aim of this study was to investigate the effect of a diet naturally contaminated with a low concentration of DON (0, 280, 560, or 840 microg/kg of feed) on performance of weanling piglets and on 34 hematological, biochemical, and immune variables. Low doses of DON did not alter the animal performances (feed intake and BW gain). Such low levels of DON did not modify the 9 hematological variables measured (including white blood cell, red blood cell, and platelet counts, relative numbers of neutrophils and lymphocytes, and hematocrit and hemoglobin concentrations) or the 18 biochemical variables tested (including cations, glucose, urea, creatinine, bilirubin, cholesterol and triglyceride concentrations, and plasma enzyme activity). Similarly, no effect of low doses of DON was observed on the immune responses of the animals (immunoglobulin subset concentration, lymphocyte proliferation, and cytokine production).