Experiments on the Prevention of Infectious Anatine Hepatitis with Serum of Duck Surviving Infection

Abstract

A disease broke out among ducklings in Ibaraki and Saitama Prefectures from February to August in 1963. It brought about a fatality rate of about 50 per cent. A virus was isolated and proved serologically to be identical with the virus of infectious anatine hepatitis which broke out in Chiba Prefecture in 1962. It was strongly pathogenic only for young ducklings. Neutralizing antibody was not observed in the serum of ducklings which were prior to clinical infection, but was present in that of surviving ones (35 to 50 days old) in a titer of more than 2.0. Then experiments were carried out to determine whether the serum of such surviving ducklings was effective to prevent infectious anatine hepatitis or not. The results obtained are as follows.
1. Three-day-old ducklings were injected intramuscularly with 0.1, 0.5, or 1.0cc of serum. When they were inoculated with concentrated virus 4 hours after serum injection, they survived infection without exception.
2. In some area where the infection was prevailing, 3-to 8-day-old ducklings were injected with not less than 0.3cc of serum. As a result, no death occurred to any one of them.
In conclusion, it seems that 3-to 8-day-old ducklings in epizootic areas may be prevented effectively from this infectious disease when they are injected intramuscularly, before the establishment of infection, with 0.3 to 0.5cc of serum of ducklings surviving infection with antibody of high titer.