In vitro comparison of foot-and-mouth disease virus subtype variants causing disease in vaccinated cattle.

Foot-and-mouth disease virus isolates of types O, A and SAT 2, from diseased animals in herds routinely vaccinated twice a year were compared antigenically with the vaccine strains in the complement-fixation, neutralization and radial immunodiffusion tests. It was found that strains which had readily infected vaccinated cattle had R values against the vaccine strain in the complementfixation and radial immunodiffusion tests of 30 or less, while strains causing primary outbreaks with little spread had R values of 30-40. Threefold differences in humoral neutralizing antibody concentration between the field variant and the vaccine strain in sera from vaccinated animals were likely to be significant in terms of protection.