Eye and nose discharge or swollen eyelids.
Clinical signs vary with younger animals being more severely affected. Scabs from the skin lesions are also infectious and can survive in the environment. The virus is found in saliva, secretions from the nose, eyes, milk, urine and faeces. SPPV and GTPV cause pox in sheep and goats. Please see the Defra website for advice on how to spot and report the disease. Both viruses possess an envelope, capsid and double stranded DNA genome. Recombination can also occur between sheep and goat strains, creating a range of host preferences and virulence.
Some strains are able to infect both sheep and goats whilst others are host specific. They are members of the Poxviridae, genus Capripoxvirus and were believed to be strains of the same virus, but genetic sequencing has shown they are closely related separate viruses. The sheeppox virus (SPPV) and goatpox virus (GTPV) are contagious viral skin diseases of sheep and goats.