Objective To examine the density, type and pathogen carrying of rodents in Liupan Mountain area, Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region for providing references to local prevention and control of rodent-borne diseases.
Methods The survey was conducted at Old Longtan scenic site and two towns in Liupan Mountain area during September 2020. Rodents were trapped at night with mousetraps placed near bushes, in farmlands and indoors. Heart, spleen and lung tissues of the trapped rodents were sampled for detections of hantavirus, Bartonella, Borrelia burgdorferi, Ehrlichia, severe fever with thrombocytopenia syndrome virus (SFTSV) and Rickettsii mooseri with reverse transcription quantitative real-time polymerase chain reaction (RT-qPCR). Fisher exact test was adopted in data analysis.
Results Totally 88 rodents of 3 families, 5 genera, and 7 species were caught, indicating a rodent density of 11.00%. Among the rodents trapped, the proportion of Apodemus peninsulae was the highest (36.36%, n = 32), followed by Cricetulus migratorius (26.14%, n = 23), Tscherskia tritonde Winton (21.59%, n = 19), Apodemus agrarius (11.36%, n = 10), Niviventer confucianus (2.27%, n = 2), Eozapus setchuanus Pousargues (1.14%, n = 1) and Mus musculus (1.14%, n = 1). The detection rate of Bartonella, Borrelia burgdorferi and Ehrlichia were 46.59%, 5.68% and 9.09%, respectively. The coinfection of detected pathogens was found, with a coinfection rate of 10.23% for all the rodents and the highest coinfection rate of 26.32% in Tscherskia tritonde Winton. No SFTSV, Rickettsii mooseri and hantavirus were detected.
Conclusion In Liupan Mountain area, there are abundant species of rodents and natural infection of Bartonella, Borrelia burgdorferi and Ehrlichia and coinfection of the pathogens are prevalent in the rodents, suggesting deratization and surveillance on rodent-borne diseases needs to be promoted in the region.
DownLoad: