An epidemic of fatal posterior paralysis and sudden death in goats: a case report.

An epidemy of fatal posterior weakness was observed in Norwegian dairy goats with a spontaneous character (high fever, collapse, death). Clinical, postmortem, and histopathological findings indicated gastroenteritis, liver damage (necrotic foci), soft kidneys, pneumonia, and depletion of liver glycogen in goats up to 4 months of age. In older animals there was a prevalence of muscle degeneration. Indigenous goats did not exhibit any mortality, whereas the mortality rate in male crosses Norwegian X Tanzanian was 100%, regardless of their age. In young goats, the existence of a high mortality infectious syndrome with enterotoxaemia and fever is suspected, whereas older goats were probably exposed to a non-infectious myodegeneration.