Occurrence And Geographical Distribution Of Antibodies To Hepatitis E Virus In Wild Boars Of Saxony-Anhalt, Germany (2011)

Hepatitis E Virus (HEV) may cause acute hepatitis in humans. In industrialised countries, acute hepatitis E generally occurs only sporadically. However, in recent years an increase in the number of reported cases has been observed. Concerning autochthonous, non-travel-associated cases, a zoonotic transmission, particularly from the animal reservoirs of domestic pig and wild boar, and via undercooked meat is assumed. Meanwhile, HEV has been detected in domestic pig holdings as well as in wild boars in many regions of the world, including Europe and Germany. The samples from wild boars in the German investigations usually originated from different sub-regions with relatively small sample sizes per region with no samples stemming from the territory of the federal state of Saxony-Anhalt. Therefore, in 2011 330 blood samples from wild boars were examined serologically for antibodies to HEV, genotype 3, in Saxony-Anhalt. An average seroprevalence of 33% and a non-homogeneous spatial distribution of positive samples with statistically significant clusters in the southwest and east of the state territory were found.