Genetically marked vaccines for improved control or eradication of Rinderpest and antigenically related diseases

Rinderpest is a serious contagious disease of cattle, Asian buffalo, yak and many other herbivores both domesticated and wild, including swine, African buffalo, giraffe and lesser kudu. Rinderpest is caused by a virus which is related closely to that of human measles, canine distemper, peste des petits ruminants and other viruses in the morbillivirus subgroup of the paramyxoviruses. Rinderpest, pests de petits ruminants (PRP) and diseases caused by the capripox virus are major and potentially economically crippling diseases of livestock in many parts of the World, especially Sub-Saharan Africa. The need to control these two important groups of diseases was approached through the development and testing of a recombinant capripox virus-rinderpest vaccine. This dual capripox / rinderpest virus vaccine protects cattle against lumpy skin disease and rinderpest and sheep and goats against pox diseases under African conditions.