MONITORING OF RABIES IMMUNE STATUS IN EXPERIMENTALLY VACCINATED PUPPIES

Hegazy, Dalia N; Hosseny, Ebtesam N; Abo-Senna, Amal S; Salem, Zeinab T; Khodeir, Mohamed H

doi:10.21608/ajps.2023.332175

MONITORING OF RABIES IMMUNE STATUS IN EXPERIMENTALLY VACCINATED PUPPIES

Document Type : Original Article

Authors

¹ Department of Biology and Immunology, Faculty of Since; Al-Azhar University Girl’s Branch Cairo, Egypt.

² Department of Pet Animal vaccine Research, Veterinary Serum and Vaccine Research Institute, Abasia- Cairo, Egypt

10.21608/ajps.2023.332175

Abstract

Rabies is a lethal viral disease that poses a great risk to both humans and animals. Therefore, there is an urgent need to manage it in the primary hosts, particularly dogs, by immunising them with powerful vaccines and boosting their immune response to provide them a high level of protective immunity. Following up the immune status of experimentally vaccinated different puppy’s groups with the locally manufactured inactivated rabies vaccine via the use of serum neutralization test (SNT) revealed that BCG induced earlier and higher levels of antibodies with a men value 106.6 by the second month post vaccination when inoculated simultaneously with rabies vaccine than in case of rabies vaccination alone (53.3). Also, indirect enzyme linked immune sorbent assay (ELISA) showed higher titer (6log10) in puppies receiving BCG vaccine than in those received rabies vaccine alone (4.5log10) by the 2nd month post vaccination. The results of ELISA kit test confirmed that BCG with rabies vaccine induced higher protection percentage (90%) than that induced by rabies vaccine alone (85%) by the first week and second month post vaccination. In addition, latex agglutination test (LAT) was able to determine rabies antibodies in the sera of vaccinated puppies showing strong agglutinations with high antibody titers and weak agglutinations with low antibody titers through the first and last week’s post vaccination in a parallel manner to the results of SNT; indirect ELISA and ELISA kit. On the other side, the indirect fluorescent antibody technique (FAT) confirmed that inoculation of BCG simultaneously with rabies vaccine resulted in earlier and higher levels of rabies antibodies than those induced by rabies vaccine alone with positive reactions up to dilutions of 6log10 and 5log10 respectively by the second month post vaccination. So, it could be concluded that BCG can be used as immune enhancing agent to improve the immunological response of vaccinated puppies to rabies vaccine. In addition, all of the used serological tests are able to determine rabies antibodies in the sera of vaccinated animals quantitatively.

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