Contagious Bovine Pleuropneumonia Epidemiology

The incidence and distribution in Montana and elsewhere, along with the information regarding the spread of the disease.

Distribution

Contagious bovine pleuropneumonia is endemic in most of Africa. It is a problem in parts of Asia, especially India and China. Periodically, CBPP occurs in Europe, and outbreaks within the last decade have occurred in Spain, Portugal, and Italy.

Contagious bovine pleuropneumonia was eradicated from the United States in 1892. It is of historical interest that the Bureau of Animal Industries, which is the forerunner of the USDA's Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service, was formed in 1884 specifically to eradicate CBPP.

Currently, CBPP is not present in the Western Hemisphere.

Transmission

The disease spreads slowly. CBPP is most easily spread in the early stages of infection. The disease is spread through direct transmission - contact between sick and healthy animals. Infected cattle begin to breathe out bacteria during the incubation period before symptoms develop. Infected cattle breathe and cough out droplets of moisture containing Mycoplasma mycoides. The bacteria are then inhaled by nearby cattle. Exposed cattle, if susceptible, may develop CBPP and are considered infectious for at least 6 months after exposure to cattle with the disease.

Cattle vary greatly in their susceptibility to CBPP. Cattle in closely confined quarters have higher rates of infection than cattle on the open range due to their close proximity to each other.

Some cattle can be carriers introducing the disease into previously uninfected areas. In fact, most new outbreaks can be traced to a carrier or to a healthy looking animal in the incubation stage of CBPP that was moved into a susceptible population.