Inactivation of chicken anaemia virus in chickens by heating and fermentation

The transmission of pathogenic microorganisms such as viruses by the use of animal products in animal feed constitutes a potential risk to the health of livestock. To reduce the risk, it is necessary to understand the survival of viruses during the processing of animal products to feed-stuffs. Since chicken anaemia virus (CAV) is very resistant to inactivation, we used it as a model for the inactivation of pathogenic viruses during treatment of animal products. It is concluded that fermentation of CAV viraemic tissue did not affect the inactivation of CAV, however, heating at a core temperature of 95 degrees C for 30 min or 100 degrees C for 10 min is sufficient to inactivate CAV. Compared with the conditions for inactivation reported in the literature for other pathogenic viruses, our treatment is more stringent. CAV viraemic chickens are thus suitable as a model to test the heat inactivation of pathogenic viruses.