Joint Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, Yamaguchi University, Yoshida, Yamaguchi, 753-8511, Japan; Department of Veterinary Science, National Institute of Infectious Diseases, Toyama, Shinjuku-ku, Tokyo, 162-8640, Japan.
Division of Experimental Animals Research, National Institute of Infectious Diseases, Tokyo, 208-0011, Japan.
Vet Microbiol. 2021 Dec;263:109275. doi: 10.1016/j.vetmic.2021.109275. Epub 2021 Nov 11.
Rabbit hepatitis E virus (HEV) has been detected among rabbits and recently isolated from immunocompromised patients, suggesting zoonotic transmission. In this study, HEV infection among feral rabbits (Oryctolagus cuniculus) was assessed by detection of anti-HEV antibodies and HEV RNA. The prevalence of anti-HEV antibodies in sera was of 33 % (20/60) and HEV RNA was detected from only one of fecal swabs (1.7 %, 1/58). Furthermore, one naïve rabbit was intravenously inoculated with the suspension of the HEV-positive fecal specimen, exhibiting persistent HEV shedding in feces, intermittent viremia, seroconversion to anti-HEV IgM and IgG, and high alanine aminotransferase (ALT) values, indicating persistent HEV infection. The isolate JP-59 had a length of 7,282 bp excluding a poly (A) tail and possessed the characteristic 93 bp-insertion in ORF1. Phylogenetic analysis indicated that JP-59 formed a cluster with other rabbit HEV isolates from rabbits and human origin. The JP-59 shared the nucleotide sequence identities less than 87 % with other rabbit HEVs, suggesting that a novel rabbit HEV strain was circulating in Japan.
兔戊型肝炎病毒 (HEV) 已在兔群中被检测到，并最近从免疫功能低下的患者中分离出来，提示存在人畜共患病传播的可能性。在本研究中，通过检测抗-HEV 抗体和 HEV RNA 来评估野生兔（Oryctolagus cuniculus）中的 HEV 感染情况。血清中抗-HEV 抗体的流行率为 33%（20/60），仅从 58 份粪便拭子中检测到 1 份 HEV RNA（1.7%，1/58）。此外，一只未接种疫苗的兔子经静脉接种了含有 HEV 阳性粪便标本的悬液，表现出持续的粪便中 HEV 脱落、间歇性病毒血症、抗-HEV IgM 和 IgG 血清转换以及高丙氨酸氨基转移酶（ALT）值，表明存在持续的 HEV 感染。分离株 JP-59 的长度为 7282bp，不包括 poly(A)尾巴，并且在 ORF1 中具有特征性的 93bp 插入。系统进化分析表明，JP-59 与来自兔和人类的其他兔 HEV 分离株形成一个聚类。JP-59 与其他兔 HEV 的核苷酸序列同一性小于 87%，提示一种新型兔 HEV 株在日本流行。
