A novel approach to bovine viral diarrhea virus surveillance

Bovine viral diarrhea virus (BVDV) causes significant economic loss in both the beef and dairy cattle industries. A major factor in the perpetuation of the virus in a herd of cattle is the presence of persistently infected (PI) animals. They continuously shed virus and often go unnoticed. Control measures currently advise testing of all animals in a herd for the presence of BVDV. While ear notching can accurately detect a PI animal, it is labor intensive and costly. For this reason the development of a non-invasive, cost-saving method to detect the virus within a group of cattle would be beneficial to the industry.