Seroepidemiology and associated risk factors of Toxoplasma gondii in sheep and goats in Southwestern Ethiopia

Abstract

Background T.gondii is a global zoonotic disease and is considered as the most neglected tropical disease in sub-Saharan countries. The exact seroepidemiological distribution and risk factors for the infection of food animals and humans in Ethiopia was less studied although, such studies are important. The objective of the current study was to determine the seroprevalence and potential risk factors of T. gondii infection in sheep and goats in Southwestern Ethiopia.MethodsCross sectional study was conducted from November 2014 to March 2015 in South west Ethiopia in four selected districts of Jimma zone (n = 368). Slide agglutination test (Toxo-latex) was used to detect anti-T.gondii antibodies. Logistic regression was used to determine potential risk factors.ResultsAn overall seroprevalence of 57.60% (212/368; 95% CI: 52.55–62.6) was detected. 58.18% (148/252; 95% CI: 52.75–64.88) and 55.18% (64/116; 95% CI: 46.13–64.23) sero prevalence was found in sheep and goats respectively. Multivariable logistic regression analysis showed that the risk of T. gondii infection was significantly higher in adult sheep and goats [(sheep: Odds Ratio (OR) = 2.5, confidence interval (CI): 1.19–5.23; p = 0.015), (goats: OR = 3.9, confidence interval (CI):1.64–9.41: p = 0.002)] than in young sheep and goats, in female [(sheep: OR = 1.93, CI: 1.11–3.36, p = 0.018, (goats: OR = 2.9, CI: 121–6.93, p = 0.002)] than in males sheep and goats, in Highland [(sheep: OR = 4.57, CI: 1.75–12.66, P = 0.000, (goats: OR = 4.4, CI: 1.75–13.66, p = 0.004)] than sheep and goats from lowland.ConclusionThis study indicates that seroprevalence of latent toxoplasmosis in small ruminants is high, therefore, it is decidedly indispensable to minimize risk factors exposing to the infection like consumption of raw meat as source of infection for humans.Electronic supplementary materialThe online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s12917-016-0906-2) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

Large-Scale Epidemiological Study onToxoplasma gondiiSeroprevalence and Risk Factors in Sheep in Estonia: Age, Farm Location, and Breed Associated with Seropositivity

“…As expected, being an adult sheep was a risk factor for T. gondii seropositivity, also in the final model wherein the breed of the sheep and the location of the farm were included (Table 2). Older age has been identified as a risk factor for T. gondii seropositivity also in other studies (Dumétre et al 2006, Halos et al 2010, Lopes et al 2013a, Tegegne et al 2016, Deksne et al 2017. These results indicate that most ovine T. gondii infections are acquired postnatally.…”

“…The age of each sheep was rounded to full months. Age was evaluated as a dichotomous variable (lamb: <12 months vs. adult: ‡ 12 months) (Halos et al 2010, Tegegne et al 2016, Deksne et al 2017, as a continuous variable, and graphically as a categorized variable. The breeds were evaluated as dummy variables; the breeds presented by <10 sheep were categorized as 'other breed'.…”

Molecular and serological prevalence of Toxoplasma gondii and Anaplasma spp. infection in goats from Chongqing Municipality, China

“…The molecular prevalence of T. gondii was estimated to be 37.65% population, and the seroprevalence was 42.47% by ELISA ( Table 2 ). The prevalence of T. gondii in goats has been reported to vary from 1.34% to 55.18% [ 1 , 2 , 4 , 11 , 12 , 29 ]. The relatively high prevalence of T. gondii in goats in Chongqing may be related to: 1) the oocysts of T. gondii excreted by infected cats that can easily develop to infective stages under the subtropical monsoon climate and humid weather in Chongqing and that are ingested by goats during grazing, and 2) the fact that most goats investigated in Chongqing were semi-housed, potentially increasing the risk of T. gondii sporulated oocyst ingestion in wild grazing conditions.…”

Seroprevalence of anti-Toxoplasma gondii antibodies in Egyptian sheep and goats

“…The higher prevalence in goats was in line with Barakat et al [ 6 ], who found prevalences of 55% and 44% in 306 goats and 320 sheep, respectively, from the Giza governorate; however, Ghoneim et al [ 5 ] found prevalences of 42% and near 100% in 10 goats and 61 sheep from the Faiyum governorate, but this could have been due to the very low sample size. A higher T. gondii infection in goats than in sheep may be due to differences in herding practices [ 18 ], although this requires further investigation. The observed difference may also be confounded by a different age at slaughter; unfortunately, information on the age of the sampled animals was not available.…”