First report of equine parvovirus‐hepatitis‐associated Theiler’s disease in Europe

Abstract

Theiler's disease, also known as equine serum hepatitis or idiopathic acute hepatitis, is an often-fatal disease of adult horses that was first described in 1918 in South Africa by Sir Arnold Theiler. 1 Since the original report, serum hepatitis has been described in horses worldwide and is associated with the administration of a number of equine biological products including tetanus antitoxin, 2-8 botulinum antitoxin, 9 pregnant mare's serum, 3 equine plasma, 10 Streptococcus equi antiserum 3,11 and more recently, allogeneic stem cell preparations. 12 Horses that are in contact with equine biological-associated Theiler's

Equine parvovirus hepatitis

“…Liver tissue from all four horses tested PCR-positive for EqPV-H (Table 2B) [26]. Analysis of commercial equine serum pools from New Zealand, the USA, Italy, Germany, and Canada for EqPV-H yielded 61.1% (11/18) PCR-positivity and 77.8% (14/18) seropositivity [37].…”

“…Surveillance studies in clinically healthy horse populations in the USA, China, Germany, and Austria have demonstrated DNA prevalence between 7.1% and 17% (Table 2A and B) [16; 32-36] and seroprevalence between 15% and 34.7% (Table 2A and [15; 21; 25]. The first report of EqPV-H-associated serum hepatitis in Europe came from Slovenia, where four horses on one farm were diagnosed with fatal Theiler's disease [26].…”

“…Therefore, EqPV‐H infection could be excluded in only one case of chronic severe hepatopathy 23 . Since the discovery of EqPV‐H and with the exception of a single case, 15 EqPV‐H has been detected in all recently reported cases of Theiler's disease 14‐16,25‐27 . EqPV‐H is, therefore, a likely cause of subclinical to severe hepatitis and presumably the causative agent of Theiler's disease 2 .…”

“… 16,33,35 Markedly higher DNA prevalence has been reported on farms with recently documented cases of equine serum hepatitis in the United States and Canada (Tables 2A and 2B). 15,21,25 The first report of EqPV‐H‐associated serum hepatitis in Europe came from Slovenia, where four horses on one farm were diagnosed with fatal Theiler's disease 26 . Liver tissue from all four horses tested PCR‐positive for EqPV‐H (Table 2B).…”

Equine pegiviruses cause persistent infection of bone marrow and are not associated with hepatitis

“…Since pegiviruses generally are not associated with clinical disease, it was a surprise when TDAV was found in an outbreak of acute serum hepatitis [13]. No additional links between EPgV-2 and clinical cases of equine liver disease have been reported; instead a recently discovered parvovirus (EqPV-H) appears responsible for a number of Theiler's disease cases in horses [36][37][38][39][40][41]. So far, however, the possible link between equine pegiviruses and hepatitis has not been formally examined.…”