Incidence and Molecular Characterization of Infectious Bursal Disease Virus in Commercial Broilers in Pakistan

Muhammad Zahoor, Muhammad Abubakar, Saima Naim, Qaiser Khan, Muhammad Arshed

a Department of Veterinary Microbiology and c Department of Chemistry, University of Agriculture Faisalabad-38040, Pakistan;b National Veterinary Laboratory, Park Road, Islamabad, Pakistan; d National Institute for Biotechnology and Genetic Engineering Faisalabad-38040 Pakistan

Corresponding Author: hayee41@gmail.com

Abstract :

The study was conducted to determine the prevalence of infectious bursal disease virus (IBDV) at different ages in commercial boilers. From Oct 2003 to Nov 2004, bursa samples collected from both vaccinated as well non-vaccinated commercially reared broiler chickens suspected of having infectious bursal disease were analyzed for the presence of IBDV using reverse transcriptase polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR). A 743-bp fragment of the VP2 hypervaraible region from the nucleotides 701 to 1444 was amplified. Out of the 237 tested samples 103 (43.45%) were found to contain IBDV genome using RT-PCR. The percentage of positive results in all age groups despite of the discrimination between vaccinated and nonvaccinated birds was 26.53 % in 0-3 weeks, 56.30 % in 3-6 weeks and 33.34 % in 6-8 weeks of age, respectively. Results indicated increased incidence of IBDV in non-vaccinated (47.91 %) birds as compared to vaccinated birds (35.05 %).