Infection with Hemotropic Mycoplasma Species in Patients with or without Extensive Arthropod or Animal Contact

Abstract

b PCR amplification targeting the 16S rRNA gene was used to test individuals with and without extensive arthropod and animal contact for the possibility of hemotropic mycoplasma infection. The prevalence of hemotropic mycoplasma infection (4.7%) was significantly greater in previously reported cohorts of veterinarians, veterinary technicians, spouses of veterinary professionals, and others with extensive arthropod exposure and/or frequent animal contact than in a previously reported cohort of patients examined by a rheumatologist because of chronic joint pain or evidence of small-vessel disease (0.7%). Based upon DNA sequence analysis, a Mycoplasma ovis-like species was the most prevalent organism detected; however, infection with "Candidatus Mycoplasma haematoparvum" and a potentially novel, but incompletely characterized, hemotropic Mycoplasma species was also documented. Historical exposure to animals and arthropod vectors that can harbor hemotropic Mycoplasma spp. should be considered during epidemiological investigations and in the evaluation of individual patients.

Detection of Mycoplasma haemocanis, Mycoplasma haematoparvum, Mycoplasma suis and other vector-borne pathogens in dogs from Córdoba and Santa Fé, Argentina

“…Most if not all of the bacterial pathogens detected during this study are zoonotic [30–33], which not only represent risk for companion animals, but also for people. Unfortunately, the information about the importance and risks related to canine vector-borne pathogens available to veterinarians, public, and the medical community, is very scarce, limited, or simply inexistent.…”

Widespread infection with hemotropic mycoplasmas in bats in Spain, including a hemoplasma closely related to “Candidatus Mycoplasma hemohominis”

“…All positive samples were characterized by one heminested and one nested PCRs, amplifying 492 bp and 1003 bp of the 16S rRNA gene, respectively, with an overlapping fragment of 175 bp to allow the sequence assembly. The first round was the same for the two PCRs, using Hemo-F1 and Hemo-R2 primers [8], subsequently amplified by two different reactions using Hemo-F1 and Hemo-R1 primers [8] and Myco 16S-322s and HemMycop16S-1420as [5], respectively. Both PCR fragments were sequenced with primers previously described [4,7,8] (Table 1) and manually assembled.…”

“…Hemotropic mycoplasmas or hemoplasmas are distributed worldwide, unculturable, cell wall-less bacteria that reside on the surface of erythrocytes of mammals [2]. Hemoplasma infection has been reported in a wide range of hosts, including humans [3][4][5], domestic animals [2,6], and wildlife [7,8]. Hemoplasmas can cause variable degrees of hemolytic anemia in infected hosts [2,4].…”

Overview of Zoonotic Diseases in Turkey: The One Health Concept and Future Threats

“…Although the infection is mainly described as vector-borne and transmitted by blood-feeding arthropods, such as ticks and fleas, the disease might also be transmitted through other routes, such as mechanically with contaminated operation tools or blood transfusions and vertically in the intrauterine period (108). Rhipicephalus appendiculatus transmits the infection to dogs by co-feeding (109). In Turkey, a clinical case of feline hemoplasmosis associated M. haemofelis was reported (110 (122).…”