Typhus and other louse-transmitted bacterial infections in Peruvian sierra communities are known to occur but have not recently been assessed. In this study, 194 of 1,280 inhabitants of four villages in Calca Province in the Urubamba Valley were included. Thirty-nine (20%) of the 194 volunteers had antibodies to Rickettsia prowazekii, whereas 24 (12%) had antibodies to Bartonella quintana and 2 against Borrelia recurrentis. There was a significant correlation between the presence of infesting ectoparasites and antibodies to R. prowazekii, as well as between antibodies to R. prowazekii and ectoparasite infestation and fever in the previous 6 months. The proportion of inhabitants infested with ectoparasites was significantly higher in the highest-altitude village than in the other three villages. Two volunteers' antibody levels suggested a recent typhus infection, but only B. quintana DNA was amplified from lice. Epidemic typhus remains extant in the area, and B. quintana infections were encountered and documented for the first time in South America.

Abstract. Fleas, lice, and ticks collected in Perú in a suburban area of Cusco in November 1998 were tested by polymerase chain reaction for the presence of Bartonella DNA using primers amplifying a fragment of the intergenic spacer region (ITS) gene. Three new Bartonella genotypes were detected in Pulex fleas self-collected from the beds and clothes of schoolchildren and adults. A fourth new genotype was also detected from a tick found on a sheep in the same area. One of the genotypes is closely related to B. vinsoni subsp. berkhoffii, and the others seem to originate from unknown Bartonella species, whose medical importance has yet to be clarified.

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