Visceral leishmaniasis (VL), now a day, is an endemic protozoal disease of human in Bangladesh. The disease is transmissible to canids and endemic in canids in many parts of the world including western China and India. In Bangladesh, the occurrence of VL in canids is unknown. Golden jackals, a common wild canid of Bangladesh Agricultural University (BAU) Campus, living with street dogs, cats and often get closure to human shelter. It is not surprising to find VL in golden Jackals of BAU campus, Mymensingh and this study was, therefore, aimed to identify the occurrence of leishmanial infection in their visceral organs. Venous blood, liver, kidney, spleen and bone marrow from the jackals (N=5) were collected, impression smears from these organs were made onto clean slides and stained with Giemsa’s stain. Leishmanial pro - and amastigote stages of the parasite were detected in the impression smears made from liver, spleen, kidney and bone marrow in all jackals. Leishmanial amastigote stage of the parasite was seen in the macrophages of blood, spleen and liver. Part of liver, kidney, spleen and bone marrow from the jackal were fixed in 10% buffered neutral formalin and stained with hematoxylin and eosin (H&E). Histopathological study revealed scatteredly distributed microgranuloma in the hepatic parenchyma, consisting of closely packed collection of macrophages and lymphocytes with fibrous tissue encapsulation. In kidney, chronic glomerulonephritis was seen; the inflamed areas were infiltrated with lymphocytes and macrophages. Specific pathology in spleen and bone marrow was not observed. Genomic DNA was extracted from the liver, kidney, spleen and bone marrow of jackals. Polymerase chain reaction (PCR) with species specific primers were used to identify the species of leishmanial protozoa involved. Results of PCR showed 145bp amplicon, specific for Leishmania donovani infection in all five jackals. This is the first report in Bangladesh describing the occurrence of VL in golden jackals. This result reinforce the assumption that golden jackals of BAU campus harbour leishmanial protozoa, could serve as a symptomless carrier and transmit the infection to other canids and human, require further investigation.DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.3329/bjvm.v10i1-2.15655

Golden jackals is one of the semidomestic wild carnivors of the environment of Bangladesh Agricultural University (BAU) campus and now a days very often share spend their time with native dogs and cats in the gouse food wastes . This is not unusual for jackals to share diseases of dogs and cats. This study was aimed to identify important diseases of golden jackals and categorized to their zoonotic importance. A total of five apparently healthy golden jackals were collected from BAU campus and thorough postmortem examination was carried out during the period from July to December , 2010. Histopathological studies were conducted using routine Hematoxylin & Eosin procedure. The existence of blood parasites were studied by Giemsa's staining. Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR) & Reverse Transcription-Polymerase Chain Reaction (RT-PCR) were adopted for the detection of tuberculosis (TB), canine distemper (CD) and avain influenza virus (AI) . Other diseases investigated were liverfluke, whipworm, lungworm, mites and ascariasis. Out of five jackals examined, four were infected with heartworm Dirofilaria immitis. Gross examination of a Jackal at necropsy revealed nodular lesions in lungs and suspected as a case of TB. Acid fast staining and PCR protocol specific for TB could not detect mycobacterium in the nodular lungs lesions. Results of RT-PCR with the extracted RNA from liver showed amplification of 287bp fragment specific for CD viral infection in two cases. This is the first study in Bangladesh describing infection of CD in jackals. Jackals are scavanging in nature and reasonably AI could have present in jackals. RT-PCR protocol specific for matrix protein gene of AI viruses did not amplify any nucleic acid fragment . Results of this study showed that the golden jackals of BAU campus were infected with heartworm, lungworm, liverfluke, whipeworm, ascarids, mites and CD viruses. Extensive investigation is needed to explore the existance of few other important diseases of jackals including bovine and human TB , AI, leishmaniasis, r abies, Toxoplasmosis, Infectious canine hepatitis, Taeniasis and Canine hookworm infestation. heartworm, whipworm and mites have zoonotic importance, therefore, it needs to develop stretagy to prevent their future dessimination in human and other animals.