Abstract
INTRODUCTION:
In
Brazil,
West Nile virus (WNV) was first detected, in 2018, in
horses with neurological
disease.
AIM:
We
report the first case of
WNV infection in a
horse from Ceará
state and the complete
genome sequence of an isolate from Espírito Santo
state. Both
infections occurred in 2019.
METHODS:
WNV was isolated from the
tissues of a
horse with neurological signs in Espírito Santo and sequenced by MiSeq.
RESULTS:
Phylogenetic analysis revealed that the isolate belongs to lineage 1a,
clustering with the NY99
strain, a
strain that has not circulated in the USA since 2005.
CONCLUSIONS:
Our findings reinforce the hypothesis that WNV has been silently circulating in
Brazil for many years.