Seroprevalence and Risk Factor Associated with Endemicity of Theileria equi Infection in Horses in Rajasthan State, India

Abstract

Background: Equine piroplasmosis is a haemoprtozoan disease of equids and enzootic in Rajasthan prefecture of India. In endemic areas, the subclinical condition is more common, as infected equids recover from the disease and become latently infected. This study aimed to investigate the seroepidemiology and risk factors associated with the endemicity of Theileria equi infection in Rajasthan state. Methods: A cross-sectional study on the seroprevalence of Theileria equi, was performed. Total of 151 serum samples collected from different areas of Rajasthan. The serum samples were screened by ELISA for assessment of seroprevalence of T. equi infection.Result: Overall seroprevalence of T. equi was 49.66%. A total of 75 T. equi seropositive horses were detected and one horse was clinically positive for T. equi infection. The clinical signs observed were - fever, haemoglobinuria, mild colic, anaemia and icteric conjunctival mucous membrane. Theileria equi infection is endemic among horses in Rajasthan state and Ajmer district found the most endemic. Haematological observations in T. equi clinically infected and healthy horses were studies. A decreased haemoglobin concentration, packed cell volume, total erythrocytic counts were observed in T. equi infected horse in comparison to healthy horses. This observation showed anaemic condition in T. equi clinically infected equine. An increased concentration of liver enzymes – AST, ALP, GGT in T. equi infected equine was also recorded, which indicated the liver damage.

Prevalence of Theileria equi and Babesia caballi Infections in Horses in South Gujarat, India

“…Prevalence studies conducted in other areas of India reported different levels of positivity as 4.17 % from Punjab (Deepak et al 2016), 5.05% from Gujarat (Vidhyalakshmi et al 2018), 5.71% from Republic of Guinea and India (Diallo et al 2018), 6.97% from Mathura, U.P. (Sanjeev et al 2020), 63.41% from Junagadh, Gujarat (Bharai et al 2020) and only one horse found positive out of 151 blood smears for T. equi using blood smear examination (Bhojani et al 2021).…”

“…Similarly, very law 0.55% (01/182) prevalence of B. caballi was reported using cELISA in Gujarat by Vidhyalakshmi (2015) whereas Khurana et al (2014) carried out sero-surveillance of T. equi on 291 samples collected from various states of India and overall prevalence of T. equi was 24.66%. Bhojani et al (2021) carried out a cross-sectional study on the seroprevalence of T. equi using cELISA in 151 horses from Bikaner, Rajasthan state, out of which 75/151 (49.66%) were found positive for T. equi. The high prevalence of piroplasmosis might be due to the carrier animals responsible for the maintenance of the infection.…”

“…In 2004, the OIE approved the competitive Enzyme Linked Immunosorbent Assay (cELISA) for detection of antibodies against T. equi and B. caballi and as a specified test for global horse activity (OIE, 2014) The prevalence rates of the T. equi were earlier reported by many workers in Gujarat and adjoining states using blood smear examinations and PCR (Sumbria et al 2016, Vidhyalakshmi et al 2018Bharai et al 2020;Sanjeev et al 2020). However, a different level of sero-prevalence of antibodies against T. equi was documented from various states of India (Khurana et al 2014;Dahiya et al 2018;Bhojani et al 2021). There is no previous serological study focusing on the occurrence of T. equi infection in horses of south Gujarat in India, therefore, present study was conducted to determine the prevalence of T. equi and B. caballi in horses by blood smears and to identify the presence of T. equi antibodies in the serum of horses with cELISA.…”