Toxoplasmosis seroprevalence in urban rodents: a survey in Niamey, Niger

• Main Authors: Mercier, Aurélien, Garba, Madougou, Bonnabau, Henri, Mboub, Mamadou Kane, Rossi, Jean-Pierre, Dardé, Marie-Laure, Dobigny, Gauthier
• Other Authors: Neuroépidémiologie Tropicale (NET), CHU Limoges-Institut d'Epidémiologie Neurologique et de Neurologie Tropicale-Institut National de la Santé et de la Recherche Médicale (INSERM)-Institut Génomique, Environnement, Immunité, Santé, Thérapeutique (GEIST), Université de Limoges (UNILIM)-Université de Limoges (UNILIM), Centre Régional AGRHYMET (CRA), Fac Sci, Université Abdou Moumouni Niamey, Direction Générale de la Protection des Végétaux, Service de l'Information Médicale et de l'Évaluation CHU Limoges (SIME), CHU Limoges, Centre de Biologie pour la Gestion des Populations (UMR CBGP), Centre de Coopération Internationale en Recherche Agronomique pour le Développement (Cirad)-Institut National de la Recherche Agronomique (INRA)-Centre international d'études supérieures en sciences agronomiques (Montpellier SupAgro)-Université de Montpellier (UM)-Institut de Recherche pour le Développement (IRD France-Sud )-Institut national d’études supérieures agronomiques de Montpellier (Montpellier SupAgro), Centre National de Référence (CNR) Toxoplasmose/Toxoplasma Biological Resource Center (BRC) (CNR Toxoplasmose-Toxoplasma BRC), Dept Format Rech, CBGP (UMR IRD/INRA/Cirad-Montpellier SupAgro)
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: HAL CCSD 2013
• Subjects: Sahel; Africa; zoonotic disease; epidemiology; Toxoplasma gondii; [SDV]Life Sciences [q-bio]; Rattus rattus
• Online Access: https://hal.science/hal-01219025; https://hal.science/hal-01219025/document; https://hal.science/hal-01219025/file/Mercier-MIOC-2013_%7BD2F94942-865F-4138-911A-EC4E89D30FD5%7D.pdf; https://doi.org/10.1590/0074-0276108042013002

A serological survey of Toxoplasma gondii was conducted on 766 domestic and peridomestic rodents from 46 trapping sites throughout the city of Niamey, Niger. A low seroprevalence was found over the whole town with only 1.96% of the rodents found seropositive. However, differences between species were important, ranging from less than 2% in truly commensal Mastomys natalensis, Rattus rattus and Mus musculus, while garden-associated Arvicanthis niloticus displayed 9.1% of seropositive individuals. This is in line with previous studies on tropical rodents - that we reviewed here - which altogether show that Toxoplasma seroprevalence in rodent is highly variable, depending on many factors such as locality and/or species. Moreover, although we were not able to decipher statistically between habitat or species effect, such a contrast between Nile grass rats and the other rodent species points towards a potentially important role of environmental toxoplasmic infection. This would deserve to be further scrutinised since intra-city irrigated cultures are extending in Niamey, thus potentially increasing Toxoplasma circulation in this yet semi-arid region. As far as we are aware of, our study is one of the rare surveys of its kind performed in Sub-Saharan Africa and the first one ever conducted in the Sahel.