Journal Article

Borrelia persica infection in dogs and cats: clinical manifestations, clinicopathological findings and genetic characterization

Baneth, Gad, Halperin, Tamar, Hershko, Yizhak, Aroch, Itamar, Straubinger, Reinhard K., Kleinerman, Gabriela, Lavy, Eran, Nachum-Biala, Yaarit, Anug, Yigal, Abdeen, Ziad

2016

Overview

Background Relapsing fever (RF) is an acute infectious disease caused by arthropod-borne spirochetes of the genus Borrelia . The disease is characterized by recurrent episodes of fever that concur with spirochetemia. The RF borrelioses include louse-borne RF caused by Borrelia recurrentis and tick-borne endemic RF transmitted by argasid soft ticks and caused by several Borrelia spp. such as B. crocidurae , B. coriaceae , B. duttoni , B. hermsii , B. hispanica and B. persica . Human infection with B. persica is transmitted by the soft tick Ornithodoros tholozani and has been reported from Iran, Israel, Egypt, India, and Central Asia. Methods During 2003–2015, five cats and five dogs from northern, central and southern Israel were presented for veterinary care and detected with borrelia spirochetemia by blood smear microscopy. The causative infective agent in these animals was identified and characterized by PCR from blood and sequencing of parts of the flagellin ( flab ), 16S rRNA and glycerophosphodiester phosphodiestrase ( GlpQ ) genes. Results All animals were infected with B. persica genetically identical to the causative agent of human RF. Phylogenetic analysis indicated that DNA sequences from these pet carnivores clustered together with B. persica genotypes I and II from humans and O. tholozani ticks and distinctly from other RF Borrelia spp. The main clinical findings in cats included lethargy, anorexia, anemia in 5/5 cats and thrombocytopenia in 4/5. All dogs were lethargic and anorectic, 4/5 were febrile and anemic and 3/5 were thrombocytopenic. Three dogs were co-infected with Babesia spp. The animals were all treated with antibiotics and the survival rate of both dogs and cats was 80 %. The cat and dog that succumbed to disease died one day after the initiation of antibiotic treatment, while survival in the others was followed by the rapid disappearance of spirochetemia. Conclusions This is the first report of disease due to B. persica infection in cats and the first case series in dogs. Infection was associated with anemia and thrombocytopenia. Fever was more frequently observed in dogs than cats. Domestic canines and felines suffer from clinical disease due to B. persica infection and may also serve as sentinels for human infection.

• Publisher: BioMed Central,BioMed Central Ltd,Springer Nature B.V
• Subject: 11th Symposium on Canine Vector-Borne Diseases / anemia / Anemia - veterinary / Animals / anorexia / Anti-Bacterial Agents - therapeutic use / antibiotics / Babesia / Biomedical and Life Sciences / Biomedicine / blood / Borrelia - cytology / Borrelia - genetics / Borrelia - isolation & purification / Borrelia persica / Borrelia recurrentis / Care and treatment / carnivores / Cat Diseases - diagnosis / Cat Diseases - drug therapy / Cat Diseases - microbiology / Cats / Central Asia / Diagnosis / Diseases / DNA / DNA, Bacterial - chemistry / DNA, Bacterial - genetics / dog diseases / Dog Diseases - diagnosis / Dog Diseases - drug therapy / Dog Diseases - microbiology / Dogs / Egypt / Entomology / Female / fever / Fever - veterinary / flagellin / genes / Genotype / human diseases / humans / India / Infectious Diseases / Iran / Israel / Lethargy - veterinary / Male / microscopy / mixed infection / Molecular diagnostic techniques / nucleotide sequences / Ornithodoros - microbiology / Ornithodoros tholozani / Parasitology / Phylogeny / polymerase chain reaction / Relapsing fever / Relapsing Fever - diagnosis / Relapsing Fever - drug therapy / Relapsing Fever - microbiology / Relapsing Fever - veterinary / ribosomal RNA / Sequence Analysis, DNA - veterinary / survival rate / thrombocytopenia / Thrombocytopenia - veterinary / ticks / Tropical Medicine / Veterinary Medicine/Veterinary Science / Virology