Rotavirus is a major causative agent of diarrhoea in children, infants, and young animals around the world. The associated zoonotic risk necessitates the serious consideration of the complete genetic information of rotavirus. A segmented genome makes rotavirus prone to rearrangement and the formation of a new viral strain. Monitoring the molecular epidemiology of rotavirus is essential for its prevention and control. The quantitative RT-PCR targeting the NSP5 gene was used to detect rotavirus group A (RVA) in pig faecal samples, and two pairs of universal primers and protocols were used for amplifying the G and P genotype. The genotyping and phylogenetic analysis of 11 genes were performed by RT-PCR and a basic bioinformatics method. A unique G4P[6] rotavirus strain, designated S2CF (RVA/Pig-tc/CHN/S2CF/2023/G4P[6]), was identified in one faecal sample from a piglet with severe diarrhoea in Guangdong, China. Whole genome sequencing and analysis suggested that the 11 segments of the S2CF strain showed a unique Wa-like genotype constellation and a typical porcine RVA genomic configuration of G4-P[6]-I1-R1-C1-M1-A8-N1-T1-E1-H1. Notably, 4 of the 11 gene segments (VP4, VP6, VP2, and NSP5) clustered consistently with human-like RVAs, suggesting independent human-to-porcine interspecies transmission. Moreover, a unique 344-nt duplicated sequence was identified for the first time in the untranslated region of NSP5. This study further reveals the genetic diversity and potential inter-species transmission of porcine rotavirus.
Getah virus (GETV), a mosquito-borne virus capable of infecting multiple economically important animal species, poses a potential epidemic risk. In May 2024, one pig farm from Heyuan, Guangdong Province, China, suffered reproductive disorders in sows and diarrhea in newborn piglets. Out of the six blood samples that were collected, three tested strongly positive for GETV, yielding a positivity rate of 50%. Moreover, a GETV strain (designated GDHYLC2024) was successfully isolated and identified. The viral titer of GDHYLC2024 was 107.687 TCID50/mL in Vero cells. Its genome was composed of 11,688 bases in length. Interestingly, compared with GDHYLC23, it had no unique 32-nucleotide repeat insertion in 3′ non-coding region. However, phylogenetic analysis showed that GDHYLC2024 and GDHYLC23 clustered in genotype III. Animal infection experiments demonstrated that the GDHYLC2024 strain was highly pathogenic to 4-day-old piglets, which caused obvious clinical symptoms including fever, depression, anorexia, periorbital edema, ataxia, and three deaths out of a total of five individuals in the infection group. This study reported re-emergence of GETV in the same region of Guangdong Province, China. The above findings suggest that GETV continuously poses a threat to farm pig’s health and has genetic diversity.