Prevalence of Korean cats with natural feline coronavirus infections

Abstract

BackgroundFeline coronavirus is comprised of two pathogenic biotypes consisting of feline infectious peritonitis virus (FIPV) and feline enteric coronavirus (FECV), which are both divided into two serotypes. To examine the prevalence of Korean cats infected with feline coronavirus (FCoV) type I and II, fecal samples were obtained from 212 cats (107 pet and 105 feral) in 2009.ResultsFourteen cats were FCoV-positive, including infections with type I FCoV (n = 8), type II FCoV (n = 4), and types I and II co-infection (n = 2). Low seroprevalences (13.7%, 29/212) of FCoV were identified in chronically ill cats (19.3%, 16/83) and healthy cats (10.1%, 13/129).ConclusionsAlthough the prevalence of FCoV infection was not high in comparison to other countries, there was a higher prevalence of type I FCoV in Korean felines. The prevalence of FCoV antigen and antibody in Korean cats are expected to gradually increase due to the rising numbers of stray and companion cats.

Circulation and genetic diversity of Feline coronavirus type I andIIfrom clinically healthy andFIP‐suspected cats in China

“…Most of the FCoV strains identified in our study belonged to type I FCoV (95.8%, 91/95) according to the phylogenetic analysis of the partial S gene; only four FCoV strains (4.2%, 4/95) were allocated to type II FCoV. In our study, the prevalence of type I FCoV in the FIP‐suspected cats was higher than that of type I FCoV in Taiwan (89.0%, p > 0.05) and Korea (54.5%, p < 0.01) (An et al., ; Lin et al., ). These data suggested that type I FCoV was more prevalent in cats in China.…”

“…A total of 126 (74.6%, 126/169) samples were positive for FCoV. Of the 126 FCoV positive samples, the positive rate of FCoV in the FIP‐suspected cats was 75.7% (87/115), which was higher than in Korea (19.3%) and Turkey (37.3%) (An et al., ; Tekelioglu et al., ). The FCoV positive rate of cats from south China (80.0%) was higher than that of north China (73.1%).…”

An update on feline infectious peritonitis: Diagnostics and therapeutics

“…The problem of laboratory contamination with PCR products can be avoided by using real time RT-PCR and, for this reason, virtually all PCR-based diagnostic tests for FECV/FIPV RNA are based on this format. It is generally conceded that real time RT-PCR is quite sensitive and specific in detecting and semi-quantitating fecal coronavirus (FECV) shedding in both experimental and naturally infected cats (Pedersen et al, 2008(Pedersen et al, , 2012Kipar et al, 2010;Vogel et al, 2010;An et al, 2011;Addie et al, 2012;Amer et al, 2012;Wang et al, 2013). However, a high sensitivity and specificity is conditional on a number of variables.…”

Feline Coronaviruses

“…The vast majority of the natural infections (80-95%) in Europe and America are caused by serotype I FCoVs, while serotype II FCoVs are less common in the field (Benetka et al, 2004;Kummrow et al, 2005). Furthermore, serotype II FCoVs have predominantly been observed in Asia and they were reported to be responsible for up to 25% of the natural infections in those countries (Amer et al, 2012;An et al, 2011;Sharif et al, 2010). There is consistent evidence from independent studies that serotype II viruses emerge via double homologous recombination between serotype I FCoV and CCoV Haijema et al, 2007;Herrewegh et al, 1998;Lin et al, 2013;Lorusso et al, 2008;Terada et al, 2014).…”