Molecular detection of Leishmania spp in Lutzomyia longipalpis in the city of Lavras, Minas Gerais, Brazil

Abstract

Leishmaniasis is a neglected disease that affects a large part of the world population. Knowing the sand fly fauna of a region is of fundamental importance for guiding health surveillance actions related to the prevention and control of leishmaniasis. A total of 86 specimens of sand flies (60 females and 26 males) were collected. Using the classification proposed by Galati (2003), the following species were identified: Lutzomyia longipalpis (Lutz & Neiva, 1912), Migonemyia migonei (França, 1920), Evandromyia cortelezzi (Brethes, 1923), Ev. sallesi (Galvão & Coutinho, 1939), Nyssomyia whitmani (Atunes & Coutinho, 1939), Psathyromyia lutziana (Costa Lima, 1932), Ev. lenti (Mangabeira, 1938), Brumptomyia sp. (França and Parrot, 1921), and Pressatia sp. (Mangabeira, 1942). Using PCR with internal transcribed spacer target to identify infected sand flies, five Lu. longipalpis females were infected with Leishmania spp. Despite the small number of specimens collected, considerable species diversity was found in the study area.

The first case of canine visceral leishmaniasis in the southern region of Santa Catarina, an emerging focus of visceral leishmaniasis in Brazil: regional report or reflection of the reality of a country?

“…As in Santa Catarina, in areas previously considered non-endemic for CVL in other states of Brazil (Steindel et al, 2013;Maziero et al, 2014), showed a similar situation when using the PCR technique for the testing of dogs as recorded in some municipalities of Rio de Janeiro (De Paula et al, 2009;Campos et al, 2013) and Minas Gerais (Castro et al, 2019). In the metropolitan region of Porto Alegre (RS), a non-endemic region, a prevalence of 4% was observed through real time PCR and serology, being the essential molecular method for excluding false negatives and false positives (Riboldi et al, 2018).…”

American visceral leishmaniasis in an ecotourism area

“…The south of Minas Gerais, where Carrancas is located is considered endemic for VL and has a relatively high diversity of sandflies. For example, the municipality of Lavras, a city in the same region and considered a focus of recent transmission, has already reported 14 different species of sandflies (Barçante et al, 2018;Milagres et al, 2018;Castro et al, 2019).…”

Detection of multiple circulating sandflies species and investigation of dogs and vectors naturally infected with Leishmania in the city of Ribeirão Vermelho, southeastern Brazil

“…Although it is considered the main transmitting species of L. infantum in the Americas, in some regions, positive human and dog cases have been verified in areas without L. longipalpis, as is the case in Jaciara, Mato Grosso, where the species L. cruzi seems to be mainly responsible for cycle transmission (Missawa et al 2011), and in Corumbá, Mato Grosso do Sul, where L. cruzi was identified as a vector of L. infantum (Oliveira et al 2016). In addition, there is strong evidence that other species, such as Migonemyia migonei (França, 1920), Pintomyia fischeri (Pinto, 1926), Lutzomyia gaminarai (Cordero et al 1928) and Nyssomyia intermedia (Lutz & Neiva, 1912), play a role in the transmission of L. infantum in some areas (Carvalho et al 2010, Saraiva et al 2010, Brasil 2014, Moya et al 2015, Galvis-Ovallos et al 2017, Castro et al 2019, 2020, Galvis-Ovallos et al 2021, Milagres et al 2022.…”