Isolation and reactivation of bovid herpesvirus 1 in goats.

A virus isolate, recovered from the brain of a goat which died following signs of nervous disease, was identified as BHV-1. Differentiation with the antigenically related caprine herpesvirus (BHV-6) was achieved by restriction endonuclease fingerprinting. Eighteen months after the last clinical episode, BHV-1 infection was reactivated in a seropositive goat from the same herd following dexamethasone treatment.