title: The Nature of Exposure Drives Transmission of Nipah Viruses from Malaysia and Bangladesh in Ferrets.
abstract: Person-to-person transmission is a key feature of human Nipah virus outbreaks in Bangladesh. In contrast, in an outbreak of Nipah virus in Malaysia, people acquired infections from pigs. It is not known whether this important epidemiological difference is driven primarily by differences between NiV Bangladesh (NiV-BD) and Malaysia (NiV-MY) at a virus level, or by environmental or host factors. In a time course study, ferrets were oronasally exposed to equivalent doses of NiV-BD or NiV-MY. More rapid onset of productive infection and higher levels of virus replication in respiratory tract tissues were seen for NiV-BD compared to NiV-MY, corroborating our previous report of increased oral shedding of NiV-BD in ferrets and suggesting a contributory mechanism for increased NiV-BD transmission between people compared to NiV-MY. However, we recognize that transmission occurs within a social and environmental framework that may have an important and differentiating role in NiV transmission rates. With this in mind, ferret-to-ferret transmission of NiV-BD and NiV-MY was assessed under differing viral exposure conditions. Transmission was not identified for either virus when naïve ferrets were cohoused with experimentally-infected animals. In contrast, all naïve ferrets developed acute infection following assisted and direct exposure to oronasal fluid from animals that were shedding either NiV-BD or NiV-MY. Our findings for ferrets indicate that, although NiV-BD may be shed at higher levels than NiV-MY, transmission risk may be equivalently low under exposure conditions provided by cohabitation alone. In contrast, active transfer of infected bodily fluids consistently results in transmission, regardless of the virus strain. These observations suggest that the risk of NiV transmission is underpinned by social and environmental factors, and will have practical implications for managing transmission risk during outbreaks of human disease.
authors.affiliation: Health and Biosecurity, Australian Animal Health Laboratory, Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation, Geelong, Victoria, Australia.
authors.forename: Bronwyn A
authors.initials: BA
authors.lastname: Clayton
authors.affiliation: Health and Biosecurity, Australian Animal Health Laboratory, Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation, Geelong, Victoria, Australia.
authors.forename: Deborah
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Middleton
authors.affiliation: Health and Biosecurity, Australian Animal Health Laboratory, Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation, Geelong, Victoria, Australia.
authors.forename: Rachel
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Arkinstall
authors.affiliation: Health and Biosecurity, Australian Animal Health Laboratory, Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation, Geelong, Victoria, Australia.
authors.forename: Leah
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Frazer
authors.affiliation: Health and Biosecurity, Australian Animal Health Laboratory, Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation, Geelong, Victoria, Australia.|Program in Emerging Infectious Disease, Duke-National University of Singapore Graduate Medical School, Singapore.
authors.forename: Lin-Fa
authors.initials: LF
authors.lastname: Wang
authors.affiliation: Health and Biosecurity, Australian Animal Health Laboratory, Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation, Geelong, Victoria, Australia.
authors.forename: Glenn A
authors.initials: GA
authors.lastname: Marsh
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D000956:Antigens, Viral / Q000302:isolation & purification; D001459:Bangladesh; D002522:Chlorocebus aethiops; D004195:Disease Models, Animal; D005289:Ferrets; D045464:Henipavirus Infections / Q000635:transmission* / Q000821:virology; D006801:Humans; D008168:Lung / Q000473:pathology / Q000821:virology; D008296:Malaysia; D045405:Nipah Virus / Q000145:classification / Q000502:physiology*; D012367:RNA, Viral / Q000032:analysis / Q000097:blood; D011897:Random Allocation; D012141:Respiratory Tract Infections / Q000821:virology; D014709:Vero Cells; D019562:Viral Load; D014779:Virus Replication; D017201:Virus Shedding
chemical_list: D000956:Antigens, Viral; D012367:RNA, Viral