Abstract
Myocarditis is often cited as the cause of fatalities associated with foot-and-mouth disease virus (FMDV) infection. However, the pathogenesis of FMDV-associated myocarditis has not been described in detail. The current report describes substantial quantities of FMDV in association with a marked mononuclear inflammatory reaction, interstitial edema and cardiomyocyte degeneration in the myocardium of two pigs that died during acute infection with either of two different strains of FMDV. Despite similar clinical progression, there was a marked variation in morphological characteristics of myocarditis with a significant difference in intensity of myocardial inflammation between the two cases. Phenotypic characterization of leukocyte populations revealed that in both cases, the inflammatory infiltrate consisted mainly of combinations of CD172a+, CD163+ and CD44+ cells, with a distinct subset of CD8+ cells, but with consistent lack of detection of CD3+ and CD21+ cells. This suggests that the FMDV-associated acute myocardial inflammation in the two observed cases consisted mainly of leukocytes of monocyte lineage, with a distinct population of CD8+ cells which, based on lack of CD3 detection in serial sections, are likely to represent NK cells.