Detection of Babesia canis subspecies and other arthropod-borne diseases in dogs from Tirana, Albania

Abstract

Summary. The importance of arthropod-borne diseases increased in the recent past in particular due to frequent travel with dogs in or by importing of dogs from regions with endemic occurrence of these diseases. While the epidemiological situation is well known for the western parts of the Mediterranean, only limited data is available for Eastern Europe and the Balkans. Thirty clinically healthy dogs from suburban areas of Tirana, Albania, were tested for Babesia canis, Hepatozoon spp., Leishmania spp., Dirofilaria spp., Ehrlichia canis, Anaplasma phagocytophilum, Bartonella spp. and Rickettsia spp. using direct and indirect methods. Antibodies against and/or pathogens of arthropod-borne diseases were detected in the blood of 20 (67%) dogs. Nineteen dogs (63%) had antibodies against B. canis, E. canis and/or A. phagocytophilum. Babesia c. canis, Babesia c. vogeli, Hepatozoon spp., D. immitis and/or E. canis were identified by blood smear, PCR or ELISA in 13 (43%) dogs. There was no evidence for Leishmania spp., Bartonella spp. and Rickettsia spp. infections.

Seroprevalence of canine heartworm (Dirofilaria immitis) infection in Albania

“…Several mosquito species which constitute suitable vectors for D. immitis (Cancrini and Gabrielli 2007), including the so-called tiger mosquito, Aedes albopictus, which was discovered for the first time in Europe in the district of Krujë, Albania in 1979, are abundant in the country (Danielova and Adham 1960;Adhami 1974;Adhami and Murati 1987;Adhami and Reiter 1998). In two recently conducted studies (Lazri et al 2008;Hamel et al 2009), 151 and 30 serum samples collected in 2007 and 2008, respectively, from dogs originating mainly from Tirana and to a lesser extent from cities along the sea side of Albania were tested with the DiroChek® Canine/ Feline Heartworm Antigen Test (Synbiotics). The combined seroprevalence of these two studies (5%) was significantly (chi-square 8.543, p<0.01) lower than the average 13.5% seroprevalence found in this survey from 1995/1996, but similar low seroprevalences were seen in some districts in this survey too (cf.…”

“…Makedonia (Ježić and Simić 1929) and Greece (e.g. Himonas 1968;Himonas and Lazarides 1974;Rallis et al 1986;Paschaleris 1988;Papazahariadou et al 1994) and environmental conditions are favourable for heartworm transmission, occurrence of D. immitis infection in Albania has been reported only recently (Lazri et al 2008;Hamel et al 2009). In the mid1990s, a survey studying the seroprevalence of canine heartworm infection was carried out in that country.…”

Epidemiological aspects on vector-borne infections in stray and pet dogs from Romania and Hungary with focus on Babesia spp.

“…The vector tick Dermacentor reticulatus is a common tick species in these two countries with considerable vector potential (Teodorescu and Popa 2002;Hornok 2009;Tudor et al 2010). D. reticulatus has a focal distribution in Germany (Lazri et al 2008;Hamel et al 2009). The authors assumed that B. canis canis infections must have occurred very recently as seroconversion was not detectable (Lazri et al 2008).…”

Canine Babesiosis: Where Do We Stand?

“…In Europe, DNA sequences of Babesia vogeli were found in Slovenia [51], Albania [48], France [63], Spain [64], Portugal [65] and Croatia [23] with prevalence from 0.01% in Spain, 0.9% in France to 1.3% in Slovenia, 1.9% in Serbia [66], and 16.3% in Central and Southern Italy [67]. Interestingly, in the research conducted in Croatia, the higher prevalence of B. vogeli is observed in asymptomatic dogs (7%) versus symptomatic dogs (1.3 %) [23].…”

“…Thus, the seroprevalence of B. canis in Croatia was 20.0%, Serbia 26.17%, France from 14.1% to 20.0% and in Western Romania 19.8% [35,36 41-43]. In other European countries the prevalence was 7.3% and 13% in Albania, 5.7% in Hungary, and from 0.8% to 17% in Italy [44][45][46][47][48]. The highest seroprevalence was obtained by Casini et al [49] in the central regions of Italy, with the prevalence of 52-57%.…”