 The first suspected case in Asia was in 1997 , though it was not until the fifth suspected case that the presence of the virus could be confirmed . This case was reported in 2006 , with the death of a young wild @-@ born female calf at an elephant sanctuary in Cambodia . The virus was identified as part of the EEHV1 group , the same as previously identified in the North American and European captive populations . In 2013 , nine lethal cases from India were extensively characterized and found to consist of a wide variety of genetically diverged strains of EEHV1A and EEHV1B matching the subtypes and genetic range of nearly all those found previously in Europe and North America . Cases attributed to EEHV1A and EEHV4 have also been reported in Thailand and there is both confirmed and anecdotal evidence for similar hemorrhagic disease deaths of between 16 and 30 more calves in Asian countries including Thailand , India , Nepal , Myanmar and Indonesia within the past five years . Thus , this is not just a disease of captive elephants , but is endogenous to and possibly rampant in Asian elephants in the wild also . Further research has been noted as " urgently required " to study the situation in regions with wild Asian elephant populations . 
