Vaccine protects cattle from bovine tuberculosis in the USA

Published 2024년 4월 1일

Tridge summary

Recent research involving teams from Penn State, Addis Ababa University, and the University of Cambridge has demonstrated the effectiveness of the Bacillus Calmette-Guérin (BCG) vaccine, traditionally used against human tuberculosis, in significantly reducing the transmission of bovine tuberculosis among cattle. Conducted in Ethiopia, the study showed that vaccinated cattle were not only protected from severe TB but also were about 90% less infectious, offering indirect protection to unvaccinated cattle. This discovery is particularly relevant for regions like Ethiopia, where there are no current control programs for bovine TB, and could greatly reduce economic losses and health risks associated with the disease. Additionally, the findings support the potential for cattle vaccination to alleviate the economic and epidemiological burden of bovine tuberculosis in countries like New Zealand, where the disease remains a persistent challenge despite extensive control efforts.

Disclaimer:The above summary was generated by Tridge's proprietary AI model for informational purposes.

Original content

Bovine tuberculosis (TB) is a livestock disease that results in large economic losses to animal agriculture worldwide. The disease can also transmit to humans and cause severe illness and death. Researchers from Penn State, Addis Ababa University and the University of Cambridge have now demonstrated that a vaccine for TB currently used in humans significantly reduces infectiousness of vaccinated livestock, improving prospects for elimination and control, according to a press release from PennState. The study published March 28 in the journal Science. The spillover of infection from livestock has been estimated to account for about 10% of human tuberculosis cases. While such zoonotic TB (zTB) infections are most commonly associated with gastrointestinal infections related to drinking contaminated milk, zTB can also cause chronic lung infections in humans. Lung disease caused by zTB can be indistinguishable from regular tuberculosis but is more difficult to treat due to natural ...

Source: The Cattle Site