Seroprevalences and local variation of human and livestock brucellosis in two villages in Gharbia Governorate, Egypt

Abstract

SummaryThis study aimed at assessing the epidemiology of brucellosis among both human and livestock populations in an endemic area in Egypt. A cross-sectional survey was conducted in two villages, where 616 inhabitants (aged 3-75 years) and 350 livestock of 97 households were enrolled. Sera were tested for Brucella spp. antibodies by tube agglutination test for both populations. Proportions of seropositive sera were 0.0 and 1.7% among the inhabitants, and 0.0 and 16% among livestock of villages I and II, respectively. Calculated seroprevalences considering the clustering of brucellosis within households were 0.03 for people and 5.2 for livestock in village II. The village variable (P = 0.07) and keeping sheep in the household (P = 0.01) were significant risk factors for human brucellosis, whereas only the village was significant for livestock (P < 0.001). Sheep showed the highest seropositive proportions of brucellosis among livestock. No association could be detected between human and livestock brucellosis. In conclusion, we found local variation of seroprevalences of brucellosis among human and livestock in the two surveyed villages. Further epidemiological studies have to be conducted in randomly selected governorates, not only to confirm the low seroprevelance of human brucellosis, but also to assess the risk factors of livestock infection for terms of prophylaxis.

Global Burden of Human Brucellosis: A Systematic Review of Disease Frequency

“…Three incidence studies did not describe the diagnostic tests used but were included because they filled gaps in available data and had otherwise well-documented methods and results [15], [17], [20]. Seroprevalence data were presented in fourteen articles, from surveys conducted in communities [22]–[28] or from blood donor screening [29]–[32]. Due to a lack of data, several studies focusing on specific sub-groups of the general population where also included: two studies of nomadic communities [33], [34] and one of school children [35].…”

“…Studies of Quality 1 and 2 were only available for 15 countries from the following GBD geographic regions: Northern African and Middle East (17 studies) [8]–[11], [14], [16], [18], [19], [22], [25]–[27], [30], [32], [34]–[36], Western Europe (8 studies) [12],[13],[17],[20],[21],[23],[24],[28], South and Central America (2 studies) [29],[31], Sub-Saharan Africa (1 study) [33] and North America (1 study) [15], as shown in Figure 2. One additional Quality 1 seroprevalence study from Central Asia [7] was identified through targeted non-systematic searching which, although not fulfilling the publication date criteria of the systematic review, was included in data analysis because it provided otherwise missing data.…”

“…Confidence intervals for seroprevalence estimates were only provided in four articles [7],[22],[25],[33]. The normal approximation to the binomial was used to calculate confidence intervals for the prevalence estimates of the remaining articles.…”

Seroprevalence of Brucellosis among Farmers and Veterinary Technical Staff in the Central States of Peninsular Malaysia

“…Brucellosis is an occupationally-associated disease and reports from different parts of the world have shown that one of the high risk groups for brucellosis are livestock farmers Bamaiyi 2016;El Sherbini et al 2007;Jama'ayah et al 2011). The findings in this study showed that farmers had a higher seroprevalence of brucellosis than veterinary technical staff which may due to the better preventive and precautionary measures usually taken by veterinary staff when handling animals based on their knowledge of routes of transmission of disease.…”

Seroprevalence of brucellosis among dairy farm workers in Mexico

“…16 The livestock composition of previous, similar studies was heterogeneous, including cattle, goats, sheep, and camels, among others; and found no clear association with unpasteurized milk consumption. 5,13,17,18 The complex dynamics in this kind of setting prevent studies from signaling a single source of infection. Conversely, in our study there was exclusive presence of bovine livestock, suggesting that close contact with infected cattle tissue is a strong associated factor.…”