Survey of Leptospirosis among Rodents in Epidemic Areas of Thailand

Abstract

Abstract To study the prevalence of infection by rodent-borne diseases in reservoir rodent species in the Northeast, Northern, Central and Southern parts of Thailand, a survey of leptospiral antibodies in rodent was conducted during the period October 1998 to April 2000. In total, sera from 1,164 rodents were collected from 10 provinces. Fifty-six sera were determined positive with the titer ≥ 1:50 by the MAT method against any of the 17 leptospira serovars used. Rodent sera collected from the Northeast, Northern, Central, and Southern Thailand, were positive at rates of 7.1%, 4.9%, 4.3% and 3.0%, respectively. The positive result of Rattus exulans, R. rattus, Bandicota indica, R. norvegicus and B. savilei were positive 6.9 (22/317), 5.0 (23/464), 3.5 (6/170), 2.6 (1/38), and 2.3 (4/175), respectively. The predominant serovars of Leptospira in R. exulans and R. norvegicus were pyrogenes, while those of R. rattus, B.indica and B.savilei were sejroe and pyrogenes; akiyami a; and others, respectively. Keywords : leptospirosis, microscopic agglutination test (MAT)