Contagious caprine pleuropneumonia (CCPP) is a cause of major economic losses to goat producers in

Africa Africa is the world's second-largest and second-most populous continent after Asia. At about 30.3 million km2 (11.7 million square miles) including adjacent islands, it covers 20% of Earth's land area and 6% of its total surfac ...

Asia Asia ( , ) is the largest continent in the world by both land area and population. It covers an area of more than 44 million square kilometres, about 30% of Earth's total land area and 8% of Earth's total surface area. The continent, which ...

and the

Middle East The Middle East (term originally coined in English language) is a geopolitical region encompassing the Arabian Peninsula, the Levant, Turkey, Egypt, Iran, and Iraq. The term came into widespread usage by the United Kingdom and western Eur ...

. Disease is caused by members of the ''

Mycoplasma ''Mycoplasma'' is a genus of bacteria that, like the other members of the class ''Mollicutes'', lack a cell wall, and its peptidoglycan, around their cell membrane. The absence of peptidoglycan makes them naturally resistant to antibiotics ...

'' – usually ''Mycoplasma capricolum'' subsp. ''capricolum'' but sometimes by ''M. mycoides'' subsp. ''capri'' or ''M. mycoides'' subsp. ''mycoides''. It is extremely contagious with very high

morbidity A disease is a particular abnormal condition that adversely affects the structure or function of all or part of an organism and is not immediately due to any external injury. Diseases are often known to be medical conditions that are asso ...

and mortality rates, causing an interstitial fibrinous pleuropneumonia in infected

goats The goat or domestic goat (''Capra hircus'') is a species of goat-antelope that is mostly kept as livestock. It was domesticated from the wild goat (''C. aegagrus'') of Southwest Asia and Eastern Europe. The goat is a member of the famil ...

. Infection is spread by close-contact aerosol, therefore overcrowding and confinement increases disease incidence. Stress factors such as

malnutrition Malnutrition occurs when an organism gets too few or too many nutrients, resulting in health problems. Specifically, it is a deficiency, excess, or imbalance of energy, protein and other nutrients which adversely affects the body's tissues a ...

and long transport can also predispose animals to disease. Goats are the only species affected, therefore the disease is not a

zoonosis A zoonosis (; plural zoonoses) or zoonotic disease is an infectious disease of humans caused by a pathogen (an infectious agent, such as a virus, bacterium, parasite, fungi, or prion) that can jump from a non-human vertebrate to a human. When ...

. There is no age breed or sex predilection, but clinical signs are often worse in younger animals.

Clinical signs

Affected animals normally have generalised signs such as depression, dullness, weakness and lethargy,

pyrexia Fever or pyrexia in humans is a symptom of an anti-infection defense mechanism that appears with body temperature exceeding the normal range caused by an increase in the body's temperature set point in the hypothalamus. There is no single agre ...

and weight loss and decreased production. They will also have respiratory signs including bilateral nasal discharge,

dyspnoea Shortness of breath (SOB), known as dyspnea (in AmE) or dyspnoea (in BrE), is an uncomfortable feeling of not being able to breathe well enough. The American Thoracic Society defines it as "a subjective experience of breathing discomfort that c ...

tachypnoea Tachypnea, also spelt tachypnoea, is a respiratory rate greater than normal, resulting in abnormally rapid and shallow breathing. In adult humans at rest, any respiratory rate of 1220 per minute is considered clinically normal, with tachypnea b ...

and

coughing A cough is a sudden expulsion of air through the large breathing passages which can help clear them of fluids, irritants, foreign particles and microbes. As a protective reflex, coughing can be repetitive with the cough reflex following three ...

. Occasionally the only sign seen is sudden death. Typical pathological lesions are very suggestive of the disease – they are localised exclusively to the

lung The lungs are the primary Organ (biology), organs of the respiratory system in many animals, including humans. In mammals and most other tetrapods, two lungs are located near the Vertebral column, backbone on either side of the heart. Their ...

and

pleura The pleurae (: pleura) are the two flattened closed sacs filled with pleural fluid, each ensheathing each lung and lining their surrounding tissues, locally appearing as two opposing layers of serous membrane separating the lungs from the med ...

. Lungs are normally a port wine colour and abundant pleural

exudate An exudate is a fluid released by an organism through pores or a wound, a process known as exuding or exudation. ''Exudate'' is derived from ''exude'' 'to ooze' from Latin language, Latin 'to (ooze out) sweat' (' 'out' and ' 'to sweat'). Medi ...

and

pleuritis Pleurisy, also known as pleuritis, is inflammation of the membranes that surround the lungs and line the chest cavity (pleurae). This can result in a sharp chest pain while breathing. Occasionally the pain may be a constant dull ache. Other sym ...

and adhesions are common. The pleural exudates may have solidified forming a gelatinous covering. Histological examination of the lung tissues may show acute serofibrinous to chronic fibrino-necrotic pleuropneumonia with neutrophilic inflammation in the

alveoli Alveolus (; pl. alveoli, adj. alveolar) is a general anatomical term for a concave cavity or pit. Uses in anatomy and zoology * Pulmonary alveolus, an air sac in the lungs ** Alveolar cell or pneumocyte ** Alveolar duct ** Alveolar macrophage * M ...

bronchioles The bronchioles ( ) are the smaller branches of the bronchial airways in the lower respiratory tract. They include the terminal bronchioles, and finally the respiratory bronchioles that mark the start of the respiratory zone delivering air to t ...

, interstitial septae and subpleural connective tissue.

Diagnosis

The simplest procedure for 'in field diagnosis' is the detection of antibodies by

latex agglutination A latex fixation test, also called a latex agglutination assay or test (LA assay or test), is an assay used clinically in the identification and typing of many important microorganisms. These tests use the patient's antigen-antibody immune respon ...

(LAT) as it is quick and simple to run, and has a long shelf-life. Other procedures used for diagnosis include growth inhibition disc tests (GI), direct and indirect fluorescent antibody tests,

complement fixation test The complement fixation test is an immunological medical test that can be used to detect the presence of either specific antibody or specific antigen in a patient's serum, based on whether complement fixation occurs. It was widely used to diagnos ...

s (CFT), indirect haemagglutination test (IHA),

ELISA The enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) (, ) is a commonly used analytical biochemistry assay, first described by Eva Engvall and Peter Perlmann in 1971. The assay is a solid-phase type of enzyme immunoassay (EIA) to detect the presence of ...

, and PCR. These have varying degrees of

efficacy Efficacy is the ability to perform a task to a satisfactory or expected degree. The word comes from the same roots as '' effectiveness'', and it has often been used synonymously, although in pharmacology a distinction is now often made betwee ...

. Isolation of ''M. capricolum ''subsp. ''capripneumoniae'' from clinical samples is the only way to definitively diagnose the infection but it is not normally performed as it is time consuming and difficult.

Treatment and control

Macrolides Macrolides are a class of mostly natural products with a large macrocycle, macrocyclic lactone ring to which one or more deoxy sugars, usually cladinose and desosamine, may be attached. Macrolides belong to the polyketide class of natural prod ...

tetracyclines Tetracyclines are a group of broad-spectrum antibiotic compounds that have a common basic structure and are either isolated directly from several species of ''Streptomyces'' bacteria or produced semi-synthetically from those isolated compounds. ...

, and

quinolones Quinolone may refer to: * 2-Quinolone * 4-Quinolone * Quinolone antibiotic Quinolone antibiotics constitute a large group of broad-spectrum bacteriocidals that share a bicyclic core structure related to the substance 4-quinolone. They ar ...

are active against ''M. capricolum'' subsp.'' capripneumoniae''. Disease incidence is reduced by good hygiene and husbandry practices. Movement restrictions and slaughtering infected animals are recommended for countries that are newly infected.

References

*''Contagious Caprine Pleuropneumonia'', reviewed and published by Wikivet at http://en.wikivet.net/Contagious_Caprine_Pleuropneumonia, accessed 31/08/2011.

External links

Current status of Contagious caprine pleuropneumonia worldwide
at OIE. WAHID Interface – OIE World Animal Health Information Database
Disease card
{{Taxonbar, from=Q21383875 Sheep and goat diseases

Clinical signs

Diagnosis

Treatment and control

See also

References

External links