Molecular epidemiological characteristics of African swine fever virus strains circulating in Viet Nam in 2020

Abstract

In this study, 550 samples from pigs suspecting with ASFV with the typical symptoms
and lesions were collected from14 provinces in 7 Agro-ecological regions in Viet Nam as the
materials for this study. The analysed result by realtime-PCR showed that 550 samples were
positive with ASFV. The results of sequencing and phylogenetic analysis showed that the ASFV
strains currently circulating in Viet Nam belonged to genotype II, serotype group 8 based on
p72 and CD2v gene, respectively, and closely related to the virus strains causing disease in
China in 2018. Based on the sequence of the IGR region between I73R and I329L genes, most
of ASFV strains currently circulating in Viet Nam belonged to IGR II variant. Our studied results
provide useful information for developing vaccines against ASFV so as to prevent and control
ASFV in Viet Nam more effectively.