Tick-borne infections are the most common group of zooanthroponotic diseases in the Northern Hemisphere. For the Baltic Sea region and Fennoscandia, the dominant infectious pathologies transmitted by ticks are tick-borne borreliosis and tick- borne encephalitis. The presence of vast forested areas, actively visited by people in St. Petersburg and the Leningrad region, contributes to a rather high level of encroachment on the flares and intelligence of the borreliosis and tick-borne encephalitis among the population of these regions. The relatively dangerous pathogens that can be transmitted with the tick bite are also of particular danger: Anaplasma sp., Ehrlichia sp., Coxiella burnetii, Rickettsia sp. In this work, detection was performed using molecular genetic methods of TBE virus, B. burgdorferi sensu lato and Rickettsia sp. in engorged ticksple, as well as questing ticks collected from vegetation. The established levels of infection of TBE on infected ticks, levels of infection by pathogenic Borrelia of questing and engorgeded ticks were approximately equal. Rickettsia was not found in the ticks. The conducted analysis of the pathogens prevalence in comparison with the data of russian and foreign authors. Monitoring the prevalence of tick-borne pathogens is an important issue in the prevention of tick- borne infections in the North-Western Russia.
Tick-borne bacterial and viral infections are widespread in middle latitudes of the Northern hemisphere. Natural foci of such infections coincide with geographic areas inhabited by ixodid ticks. Ixodid tick-borne borreliosis is a pressing issue for some territories of Russia, especially for the North-Western Federal District and St. Petersburg megalopolis as well as adjacent areas of the Leningrad District, where people may become infected after tick bite in recreational zones in suburban park areas. Currently, very few publications regarding prevalence of tick-borne pathogens in St. Petersburg area are available. In our study, questing ticks flagged in park zone (northern coast of Finnish Gulf, Kurortny District) were examined with PCR for carriage of pathogenic B. burgdorferi sensu lato complex. In addition, samples positive for Borrelia DNA signal were further genotyped with species-specific primers against rpoBgene fragment. It was found that Ixodes persulcatus dominated in this area. Prevalence of Borrelia burgdorferi s.l. complex comprised 9.33%. Genospecies B. afzelii and less frequently B. garinii were detected. A mixt-infection with two Borel-lia species was detected in one sample. Interestingly, all Borrelia-infected ticks belonged to I. persulcatus suggesting a closer association for certain species in «pathogen-vector» system. Our findings are essential in investigating distribution of ixodid borreliosis foci in St. Petersburg and suburbs, obtaining new data regarding epidemiology, diagnostics, treatment and prevention of this infection. It is noteworthy than prevalence of pathogenic Borrelia spp. vs. tick-borne encephalitis virus in vectors was higher thereby accounting for its higher morbidity. Comparing our data with those published elsewhere by European researchers allows to note that prevalence of pathogenic Borrelia spp. in ticks varies broadly in diverse geographic regions. It is necessary to take into consideration that prevalence of Borrelia markers achieves ~10% in ticks given frequent attendance of park areas near St. Petersburg that point at risk of developing bor-reliosis in recreational zones.
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