Major progress has been made in the basic research of leptospirosis. Future challenges will be to translate these advances into public health measures for developing countries. Yet the most effective responses may be interventions that directly address the determinants of poverty, such as poor sanitation, which are often responsible for transmission.

BackgroundLeptospirosis has become an urban health problem as slum settlements have expanded worldwide. Efforts to identify interventions for urban leptospirosis have been hampered by the lack of population-based information on Leptospira transmission determinants. The aim of the study was to estimate the prevalence of Leptospira infection and identify risk factors for infection in the urban slum setting.Methods and FindingsWe performed a community-based survey of 3,171 slum residents from Salvador, Brazil. Leptospira agglutinating antibodies were measured as a marker for prior infection. Poisson regression models evaluated the association between the presence of Leptospira antibodies and environmental attributes obtained from Geographical Information System surveys and indicators of socioeconomic status and exposures for individuals. Overall prevalence of Leptospira antibodies was 15.4% (95% confidence interval [CI], 14.0–16.8). Households of subjects with Leptospira antibodies clustered in squatter areas at the bottom of valleys. The risk of acquiring Leptospira antibodies was associated with household environmental factors such as residence in flood-risk regions with open sewers (prevalence ratio [PR] 1.42, 95% CI 1.14–1.75) and proximity to accumulated refuse (1.43, 1.04–1.88), sighting rats (1.32, 1.10–1.58), and the presence of chickens (1.26, 1.05–1.51). Furthermore, low income and black race (1.25, 1.03–1.50) were independent risk factors. An increase of US$1 per day in per capita household income was associated with an 11% (95% CI 5%–18%) decrease in infection risk.ConclusionsDeficiencies in the sanitation infrastructure where slum inhabitants reside were found to be environmental sources of Leptospira transmission. Even after controlling for environmental factors, differences in socioeconomic status contributed to the risk of Leptospira infection, indicating that effective prevention of leptospirosis may need to address the social factors that produce unequal health outcomes among slum residents, in addition to improving sanitation.

Summary Antibodies to Zika virus (ZIKV) can be protective. To examine the antibody response in individuals that develop high titers of anti-ZIKV antibodies we screened cohorts in Brazil and Mexico for ZIKV envelope domain III (ZEDIII) binding and neutralization. We find that serologic reactivity to dengue 1 virus (DENV1) EDIII before ZIKV exposure is associated with increased ZIKV neutralizing titers after exposure. Antibody cloning shows that donors with high ZIKV neutralizing antibody titers have expanded clones of memory B cells that express the same immunoglobulin VH3-23/VK1-5 genes. These recurring antibodies cross-react with DENV1, but not other flaviviruses, neutralize both DENV1 and ZIKV, and protect mice against ZIKV challenge. Structural analyses reveal the mechanism of recognition of the ZEDIII lateral ridge by VH3-23/VK1-5 antibodies. Serologic testing shows that antibodies to this region correlate with serum neutralizing activity to ZIKV. Thus, high neutralizing responses to ZIKV are associated with preexisting reactivity to DENV1 in humans.