Understanding human – bat interactions in NSW, Australia: improving risk communication for prevention of Australian bat lyssavirus

Quinn, Emma; Massey, Peter; Cox-Witton, Keren; Paterson, Beverley J.; Eastwood, Keith; Dürrheim, David N

doi:10.1186/1746-6148-10-144

Cited by 17 publications

(31 citation statements)

References 29 publications

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“…Given the considerable proportion of people (approximately a quarter) in the community who reported an intention to handle injured or trapped bats [20], public health interventions should adopt multiple strategies, including: 1) communicating the risk messages to the general public that they may harm the bat and put themselves at risk of contracting the fatal ABLV infection if they attempt to rescue/handle the animal [21], because an untrained person is highly likely to be injured when handling a bat, and the bat involved in human injury will be euthanised for ABLV testing. 2) advising the public to take an alternative action when encountering injured/trapped bats; for example, contacting animal rescue groups (e.g.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Potential Exposures to Australian Bat Lyssavirus Notified in Queensland, Australia, 2009−2014

Marquess

Donnan

et al. 2016

PLoS Negl Trop Dis

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BackgroundAustralian bat lyssavirus (ABLV) belongs to the genus Lyssavirus which also includes classic rabies virus and the European lyssaviruses. To date, the only three known human ABLV cases, all fatal, have been reported from Queensland, Australia. ABLV is widely distributed in Australian bats, and any bite or scratch from an Australian bat is considered a potential exposure to ABLV.Methodology/Principal FindingsPotential exposure to ABLV has been a notifiable condition in Queensland since 2005. We analysed notification data for potential exposures occurring between 2009 and 2014. There were 1,515 potential exposures to ABLV notified in Queensland, with an average annual notification rate of 5.6 per 100,000 population per year. The majority of notified individuals (96%) were potentially exposed to ABLV via bats, with a small number of cases potentially exposed via two ABLV infected horses and an ABLV infected human. The most common routes of potential exposure were through bat scratches (47%) or bites (37%), with less common routes being mucous membrane/broken skin exposure to bat saliva/brain tissue (2.2%). Intentional handling of bats by the general public was the major cause of potential exposures (56% of notifications). Examples of these potential exposures included people attempting to rescue bats caught in barbed wire fences/fruit tree netting, or attempting to remove bats from a home. Following potential exposures, 1,399 cases (92%) were recorded as having appropriate post-exposure prophylaxis (PEP) as defined in national guidelines, with the remainder having documentation of refusal or incomplete PEP. Up to a quarter of notifications occurred after two days from the potential exposure, but with some delays being more than three weeks. Of 393 bats available for testing during the reporting period, 20 (5.1%) had ABLV detected, including four species of megabats (all flying foxes) and one species of microbats (yellow-bellied sheathtail bat).Conclusions/SignificancePublic health strategies should address the strong motivation of some members of the public to help injured bats or bats in distress, by emphasising that their action may harm the bat and put themselves at risk of the fatal ABLV infection. Alternative messaging should include seeking advice from professional animal rescue groups, or in the event of human contact, public health units. Further efforts are required to ensure that when potential exposure occurs, timely reporting and appropriate post-exposure prophylaxis occur.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Potential Exposures to Australian Bat Lyssavirus Notified in Queensland, Australia, 2009−2014

Marquess

Donnan

et al. 2016

PLoS Negl Trop Dis

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“…This is comparable to other studies including a study that found 84% of preventable exposures in NSW residents between 2007 and 2011 (Kardamanidis, Cashman, & Durrheim, 2013) and 60% of preventable exposures in QLD between 2009 and 2014 reported rescuing a trapped or injured bat (Si et al., 2016). A study on risk perception of the general public in NSW found that a combination of low awareness of the seriousness of ABLV combined with a desire to help injured animals resulted in high numbers of people who said they would touch a bat and place themselves at risk of ABLV (Quinn et al., 2014).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Identification of focus areas for Australian Bat Lyssavirus potential exposure prevention in the Metro North Hospital and Health Service region

May

Mann

Francis

et al. 2020

Zoonoses and Public Health

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Australian Bat Lyssavirus (ABLV) is a fatal rabies‐like disease spread to humans from bats. All people who report bat bites or scratches in Queensland are considered potentially exposed to ABLV and are followed up and treated to prevent ABLV. Preventing members of the public intentionally interacting with bats will reduce the number of potential exposures to ABLV. In order to target public health messaging, this study examines the epidemiology of potential ABLV exposures in Metro North Hospital and Health Service (HHS), a region of Queensland that encompasses metro and rural areas in the south‐east of the state. People who intentionally handled bats during the study period were more likely to be adult (93%), male (60%), scratched (51%) by a megabat (72%) and been potentially exposed while rescuing the bat when it was trapped or injured (72%). The number of potential exposures reported in Queensland has increased since 2013; the same year, a Queensland child died of ABLV. Seasonally, exposures are more common during bat breeding and nursing periods when bats are more active (summer to autumn). Although there were more notifications in a band stretching north from the inner city to northern metro suburbs, notification rates were higher in large rural statistical areas in the north of the HHS. These data will be used to develop geographically targeted ABLV prevention messaging for the general public.

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“…Within Australia, this species has primarily been associated with the transmission of viral pathogens such as Hendra and Lyssavirus. However, bacterial pathogen carriage, particularly within faecal deposits, has been relatively overlooked [ 70 , 71 ].…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

What’s the risk? Identifying potential human pathogens within grey-headed flying foxes faeces

Henry¹,

Galbraith²,

Coutts³

et al. 2018

PLoS ONE

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Pteropus poliocephalus (grey-headed flying foxes) are recognised vectors for a range of potentially fatal human pathogens. However, to date research has primarily focused on viral disease carriage, overlooking bacterial pathogens, which also represent a significant human disease risk. The current study applied 16S rRNA amplicon sequencing, community analysis and a multi-tiered database OTU picking approach to identify faecal-derived zoonotic bacteria within two colonies of P. poliocephalus from Victoria, Australia. Our data show that sequences associated with Enterobacteriaceae (62.8% ± 24.7%), Pasteurellaceae (19.9% ± 25.7%) and Moraxellaceae (9.4% ± 11.8%) dominate flying fox faeces. Further colony specific differences in bacterial faecal colonisation patterns were also identified. In total, 34 potential pathogens, representing 15 genera, were identified. However, species level definition was only possible for Clostridium perfringens, which likely represents a low infectious risk due to the low proportion observed within the faeces and high infectious dose required for transmission. In contrast, sequences associated with other pathogenic species clusters such as Haemophilus haemolyticus-H. influenzae and Salmonella bongori-S. enterica, were present at high proportions in the faeces, and due to their relatively low infectious doses and modes of transmissions, represent a greater potential human disease risk. These analyses of the microbial community composition of Pteropus poliocephalus have significantly advanced our understanding of the potential bacterial disease risk associated with flying foxes and should direct future epidemiological and quantitative microbial risk assessments to further define the health risks presented by these animals.

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Understanding human – bat interactions in NSW, Australia: improving risk communication for prevention of Australian bat lyssavirus

Cited by 17 publications

References 29 publications

Potential Exposures to Australian Bat Lyssavirus Notified in Queensland, Australia, 2009−2014

Potential Exposures to Australian Bat Lyssavirus Notified in Queensland, Australia, 2009−2014

Identification of focus areas for Australian Bat Lyssavirus potential exposure prevention in the Metro North Hospital and Health Service region

What’s the risk? Identifying potential human pathogens within grey-headed flying foxes faeces

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