Meat juice serology for Toxoplasma gondii infection in chickens

Abstract

Toxoplasma gondii is an important foodborne zoonosis. Free-range chickens are at particularly high risk of infection and are also excellent indicators of soil contamination by oocysts. In the present study, hearts of 77 free-range chickens were collected at slaughter. T. gondii meat juice enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay was performed with a commercial kit, following validation with positive controls, from experimentally infected chickens, and negative ones. Out of 77 samples, only 66 gave sufficient meat juice for serology. Of these, 24 (36.4%) were positive for T. gondii considering the 5*standard deviation values (calculated on the optical density of negative controls), while all the samples were negative considering sample/positive% values. Parasite-specific polymerase chain reaction was carried out on all samples obtained from heart tissue and none were positive for the presence of T. gondii DNA. Results would suggest that further study on the use of meat juice with a validated serological test to detect T. gondii in chickens could lead to widespread epidemiological studies in this important intermediate host. However, sample collection and test specificity require further evaluation.

Prevalence and molecular characterization of Toxoplasma gondii in different types of poultry in Greece, associated risk factors and co-existence with Eimeria spp.

“…As the demand for slow-growth and/or free-range chicken meat keeps increasing (Ying et al 2017), special attention should be paid to T. gondii infections to reduce potential transmission to humans from undercooked meat or other raw preparations like chicken sausages or carpaccio where there might not be sufficient inactivation of the parasite (Schares et al 2018). The majority of published studies referring to free-range chickens include both commercial and hobby/backyard farms, with a range of seroprevalence from 6.6% to 90% (Asgari et al 2009;Cui et al 2010;Zhao et al 2012;Moré et al 2012;Chumpolbanchorn et al2013;Hamidinejat et al 2014;Gebremedhin et al 2014;Magalhães et al 2016;Vismarra et al 2016;Wang et al 2016;ElFadaly et al 2017;Rodrigues et al 2019;Dubey et al 2020). This wide range may be due to the use of different serological techniques and cut-off values to detect anti-T. gondii antibodies in the chicken sera, including modified agglutination test (MAT), several enzyme-linked immunosorbent assays (ELISA), indirect fluorescent antibody test (IFAT), and indirect haemagglutination (IHA).…”

Toxoplasma gondii and pre-treatment protocols for polymerase chain reaction analysis of milk samples: a field trial in sheep from Southern Italy

“…Toxoplasmosis is a zoonotic disease caused by the protozoan Toxoplasma gondii. The infection is widespread in humans and several mammals species, such as sheep, pigs, goats and cattle (Hill and Dubey, 2013 ; EFSA, 2016 ; Vismarra et al , 2016 ). In immunocompetent humans, the infection is usually asymptomatic but vertical transmission can lead to the risk of stillbirth, abortion or severe cerebral problems, as hydrocephalus (Havelaar et al , 2007 ; Hampton, 2015 ).…”

Development of a droplet digital polymerase chain reaction tool for the detection of Toxoplasma gondii in meat samples

“…Meat juice has been proven to be an excellent matrix for serological studies on T. gondii in different host species, i.e. sheep, pigs, wild boars, cattle and chickens (Meemken and Blaha, 2011;Basso et al, 2013;Meemken et al, 2014;Bacci et al, 2015;Vismarra et al, 2016Vismarra et al, , 2017Slany et al, 2016;Felin et al, 2017;Schares et al, 2018;Olsen et al, 2020;Gazzonis et al, 2020).…”