Delayed onset postvaccinal mucosal disease as a result of genetic recombination between genotype 1 and genotype 2 BVDV.

Bovine viral diarrhea viruses (BVDV) are segregated into two genotypes, BVDV 1 and BVDV 2. Viruses within both genotypes may exist as one of two biotypes, cytopathic or noncytopathic. A highly fatal form of BVDV termed mucosal disease (MD) occurs when an animal persistently infected with noncytopathic BVDV becomes superinfected with cytopathic BVDV. In this study, we characterized a noncytopathic (BVDV2-125nc)/cytopathic (BVDV2-125c) viral pair isolated from an animal that died of MD 3 months after vaccination with modified-live BVDV1-NADL. In comparison to BVDV2-125nc, BVDV2-125c contained a 366-nucleotide insertion. The insertion was in the correct reading frame for the large open reading frame of the BVDV genome and occurred in the portion of the genome that codes for the p125 viral polypeptide. There was a 99% identity between the inserted sequences found in BVDV2-125c and sequences from the vaccine virus BVDV1-NADL. These data suggest that MD was induced after a recombination between noncytopathic BVD2-125nc and cytopathic vaccine virus BVDV1-NADL created the cytopathic virus BVDV2-125c.