Study of prevalence of equine herpes virus types 1 and 4 infections in horse sera from riding clubs of Urmia

Herpesviruses can cause significant economic losses to the equine industry worldwide. Equine herpes virus type 1 (EHV-1) and type 4 (EHV-4) cause respiratory signs, abortion, neonatal death and in some cases distal limb edema and myeloencephalopathy in susceptible horses. The aim of this study was to determine the seroprevalence of EHV-1 and EHV-4 infection in club horses of Urmia in relation to age, gender, breed and clinical signs. Sera from 51 horses were tested by indirect enzyme linked immunosorbent assay (iELISA) for detection of specific antibodies against EHV-1 and EHV-4 and data were analyzed by chi-squared, fisher’s exact and logistic regression tests. A total of 9 samples (17.65%) (95% CI: 7.2-28.0) were found to be positive for specific antibodies of EHV-1 and EHV-4. Seropositivity was not affected by age (p=0.593), sex (p=0.651), breed (p=0.874) and clinical signs (p=0.824). Although in regression analysis it was found that odds of infection based on age was increased by 1.51% for every 4 year decrease in age and odds of infection was 1.549% more in females compared with males. Also age, gender and breed of horses explains 0.449, 0.437 and 0.217% of infection rate fluctuations, respectively. In conclusion, the results indicate relatively high exposure of equine herpes virus types 1 and 4 in club horses of Urmia.