In this study, the presence of the Chicken anaemia virus (CAV) in apparently
healthy broilers from the Isfahan province (central Iran) was directly investigated
using PCR method in order to determine the prevalence of the subclinical
viral infection. For that, a total of 240 thymuses were collected from
birds belonging to 15 different flocks regrouping 223 000 apparently healthy
broilers at slaughtering and the PCR amplification of the gene coding for the
viral VP2 protein was performed on thymus samples. The individual viral
prevalence was 24.58% and the rate of positive flocks (in which at least one
animal was detected as positive) reached 73.33%. These results clearly show
the high prevalence of the subclinical CAV infection in central Iran and emphasize
the requirement for developing control strategies to prevent economical
losses in poultry.
