Parasites of veterinary importance from domestic animals in uMkhanyakude district of KwaZulu-Natal province

Abstract

This study investigated the occurrence and phylogenetic relationship of protozoan parasites and Ehrlichia infecting domestic animals from three municipalities in uMkhanyakude district of KwaZulu-Natal province, South Africa. A total of 208 blood samples collected from clinically healthy cattle, sheep, goats and dogs from uMkhanyakude district were examined by polymerase chain reaction (PCR) assays, using either genus or species-specific primers to determine the occurrence and phylogenetic relationship of various protozoan parasites and Ehrlichia of veterinary importance. A total of 5/109 (4.6%) cattle were PCR-positive for the presence of Toxoplasma gondii, 33/109 (30.3%) for Babesia bovis, 24/109 (22.02%) for Babesia bigemina and 20/109 (18.3%) for Trypanosoma sp., while 3/10 (30%) of sheep were PCR-positive for Theileria ovis and none of the goats were positive for any of the detected pathogens. The co-infection of 4/109 (3.7%) B. bovis and B. bigemina was detected in cattle. Only Ehrlichia canis was detected in dogs with infection rate of 20/48 (41.7%). Sequences of PCR-positive isolates (B. bovis, B. bigemina, E. canis, T. ovis and T. gondii) showed that they were closely related to their relevant species from various countries. These findings have expanded our knowledge about the prevalence and phylogenetic similarity between protozoan parasites and Ehrlichia isolates of South African origin. To date, this is the first study in South Africa to detect T. gondii infections from cattle blood using PCR.

Toxoplasma gondii Infections in Animals and Humans in Southern Africa: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis

“…Although serological methods seem to lack sensitivity and specificity, they remain a standard tool for the qualitative detection of antibodies [64]. Studies that used LAT [3,56,60], histology [28,33,34], and molecular techniques [48,50,92] were few, while others used the combination of one or two of LAT, MAT, ELISA, IFAT, DT, CF, Wolstenholme's modification, and Sabin-Feldman dye test techniques [30,32,35,41,42,54,59,93,94]. A recent study comparing three serological diagnostic tools showed that ELISA and IFAT had relatively higher sensitivity and specificity than MAT [95].…”

“…Forest plot of prevalence estimates of Toxoplasma gondii infections in Southern Africa. The confidence interval (CI) was 95%, and the diamond represents the pooled estimate (blue squares represent point estimation of the study weighted for population size)[3,5,19,[28][29][30][31][32][33][34][35][36][37][38][39][40][41][42][43][44]46,[48][49][50][51][52][53][54][55][56][57][58][59][60][61][62][63][64][65].…”

Canine Babesiosis Caused by Large Babesia Species: Global Prevalence and Risk Factors—A Review

“…The lowest prevalences were observed in Southern Gauteng, Free State, and Western Cape, where the prevalences amounted to 4.4%, 5.4%, and 6.4%, respectively [ 41 ]. In another study, on 126 apparently healthy dogs from four welfare organizations and two townships in the greater Cape Town region (South Africa), B. rossi DNA was detected in 16 (12.7%) dogs, while in a separate study in Umkhanyakude District Municipality (KwaZulu-Natal province, South Africa), no B. rossi DNA was detected in 49 apparently healthy dogs [ 54 , 55 ]. It should also be noted that, in a retrospective study from the Onderstepoort Veterinary Academic Hospital (Faculty of Veterinary Science, University of Pretoria) in South Africa, 1222 out of 12,706 (9.6%) dogs had babesiosis during the period 2004–2010.…”

“…South Africa (7 out of 9 provinces) 36.9% (420 out of 1138) 2000-2006 [41] Cape Town region 12.7% (16 out of 126) Before 2014 1 [54] Eastern South Africa: KwaZulu-Natal province 0% (0 out of 49) Before 2020 1 [55] South Africa (Onderstepoort Veterinary Academic Hospital, University of Pretoria)…”

Status of research on two parasitic zoonoses (Toxoplasmosis and toxocariasis) in Sub-Saharan Africa and their prevalence in selected rural communities of Kwazulu-Natal Province of South Africa using free-range chickens as a case study.

“…al., 2009;Domingos et al, 2013;Tagwireyi et al, 2019), histology(Smit, 1961;Bigalke, et al, 1966;Du Plessis et al, 1967), and molecular techniques(Lukášová et al, 2018;Mofokeng et al, 2020;Rifkin et al, 2020) were few, while others used the combination of one or two of LAT, MAT, ELISA, IFAT, DT, CF, Wolstenholme's modification, and Sabin-Feldman dye test techniques(Fasser, et al., 1955; Hove et al, 2005b; Mc Connell et al, 1973; Zumla et al, 1991; Pandey, and Van Knapen 1992; Hove, T.; Dubey; Kistiah et al, 2011). A recent study comparing three serological diagnostic tools showed that ELISA and IFAT had relatively higher sensitivity and specificity than MAT (Sharma et al, 2019).…”