Molecular detection and phylogenetic analysis of newly emerging foot-and-mouth disease virus type A, Lineage EURO-SA in Egypt in 2022

Naglaa M Hagag; Ayah M Hassan; Mostafa R Zaher; Sara M Elnomrosy; Omayma A Shemies; Heba A Hussein; Eman S Ahmed; Mohamed H Ali; Mohamed Ateay; Mahmoud A Abdel-Hakim; Ahmed R Habashi; Samah Eid; Mohamed E El Zowalaty; Momtaz A Shahein

doi:10.1016/j.virusres.2022.198960

Molecular detection and phylogenetic analysis of newly emerging foot-and-mouth disease virus type A, Lineage EURO-SA in Egypt in 2022

Virus Res. 2023 Jan 2:323:198960. doi: 10.1016/j.virusres.2022.198960. Epub 2022 Oct 6.

Affiliations

¹ Genome Research Unit, Animal Health Research Institute, Agricultural Research Center, Giza 12618, Egypt. Electronic address: naglaahagagahri@gmail.com.
² Genome Research Unit, Animal Health Research Institute, Agricultural Research Center, Giza 12618, Egypt.
³ Virology Research Department, Animal Health Research Institute, Agricultural Research Center,Giza 12618 , Egypt.
⁴ General Organization For Veterinary Services, Ministry of Agriculture, Egypt.
⁵ Virus Strain Bank, Animal Health Research Institute, Agricultural Research Center,Giza 12618, Egypt.
⁶ Reference Laboratory for Veterinary Quality Control on Poultry Production, Animal Health Research Institute, Agricultural Research Center, Giza 12618, Egypt.
⁷ Veterinary Medicine and Food Security Research Group, Medical Laboratory Sciences Program, Faculty of Health Sciences, Abu Dhabi Women's Campus, Higher Colleges of Technology, Abu Dhabi 41012, UAE. Electronic address: elzow005@gmail.com.

Abstract

A newly emerging and exotic foot-and-mouth disease virus (FMDV) caused a recent outbreak of serotype A in Egypt in 2022, which affected cattle and water buffalo. Previous phylogenetic studies on FMDV circulating in Egypt have mainly focused on genomic regions encoding the structural proteins which determine FMDV serotype. No study has yet determined structural proteins sequences of the newly emerging Europe-South America (EURO-SA) lineage which was recently isolated from Egypt during a routine surveillance in 2022. The objective of the current study was to analyze the structural proteins of the Venezuelan type which belongs to EURO-SA. The new isolate was related to serotype A lineage Euro-South America. Phylogentic analyses have reveled that the newly isolated lineage samples were closely related to reported sequences that have been identified in Venzuela and Colombia. Analysis of structural protein sequences revealed the recent isolates belong to prototype strain A24 Cruzeiro. Notably, nucleotide sequences of the Egyptian isolate was related to Venezuelan, Brazilian, and Colombian strains with identity not exceeding 90%. The divergence which appears in the genetic identity of the Egyptian A/EURO-SA lineage from other related strains may be attributed to the absence of Euro-SA lineage sequence from Egypt. The present study is the first report on the detection of EURO-SA lineage in Egypt. The recent detection of the EURO-SA lineage samples may be explained due to imported animals from Colombia or Brazil which share geographical borders with Venezuela. The findings of the present study highlight the significance of continuous monitoring of FMDV in Egypt for newly emerging FMDVs.