High seroprevalence of bluetongue virus antibodies in Sheep, Goats, Cattle and Camel in different districts of Saudi Arabia

Aim: To estimate the prevalence and distribution of serum antibodies to BTV in different domesticated animals in different localities of Saudi Arabia. Materials and Methods: A total of 4845 field sera collected from different animal species within 10 districts in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia were screened for the presence of group -specific BTV antibodies by competitive ELISA (c ELISA). Results: The overall BTV antibody prevalence was 54.1%, 53.3%, 44.8% and 25.7% in sheep, goat, cattle and camel respectively (at 95% confidence level). The Jizan and Eastern Province districts were the regions with the highest prevalence resulting 65.8% of sheep, 68.2% of goats, 49.3% of cattle, 44% of camel in Jizan and 65.8% of sheep, 62.5% of goats, 53.4% of cattle, 28.5% of camel in Eastern Province positive to c-ELISA. The second highest rate was in Naj ran district where the scropositivity for Bluetongue was found to be 60% of sheep, 57.9% of goats, 47.2% of cattle and 29.3% of camel. Our results recorded positive animals in all examined districts which indicate serological evidence of exposure to infection was widely distributed all over the country. Conclusions: These results demonstrate the high occurrence of the BTV that emphasize the necessity to a well-defined control strategy for preventing and controlling the BTV in Sa udi Arabia.