Assessment of post-vaccination immune response to peste des petits ruminants virus in small ruminants in the central and western regions of India

The cross-sectional serosurvey for post-vaccination assessment of peste des petits ruminants (PPR) virus (PPRV) antibodies in sheep and goats was carried out in different states in the central and western regions of India after the implementation of vaccination under the PPR control programme. The serum samples (n = 4687) were collected from sheep (n = 1539) and goats (n = 3148) from August 2017 to March 2018 at various epidemiological units (n = 301) of the studied regions using a stratified random sampling method and PPR competitive ELISA kit was employed to detect PPRV antibodies. The results revealed 34, 21, 52, 74, 68, and 65% of prevalence of PPRV antibodies in small ruminants in Madhya Pradesh, Goa, Chhattisgarh, Maharashtra, Gujarat, and Rajasthan states, respectively, with a difference in seropositivity in sheep and goats across the states in sheep (p < 0.01) and goats (p < 0.01). Further, this serosurvey revealed that 60% of the epi-units (n = 185) had > 50% prevalence of post vaccination PPRV antibodies across states due to variations in vaccination rates and patterns. The vaccination coverage and the reported outbreaks varied between the states in the studied regions. Due to continuous vaccination under the control program, the reported PPR outbreaks have progressively declined in most of the studied states, and the PPR risk areas are confined to a few districts and sporadically, outbreaks are reported indicating the effectiveness of vaccination. These findings provide valuable information on potential PPRV episystems, and will assist with activities regarding intensive surveillance, vaccination, biosecurity, and modification of policy decisions towards designing and implementing control and eradication measures. Further, the present situation necessitates continuous mass vaccination and active surveillance programs to make these regions free from PPR in consonance with the PPR Global Control and Eradication Strategy under the PPR Global Eradication Program.

Supplementary Information

The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s13337-022-00796-6.