Abstract
BackgroundToxoplasmosis is caused by Toxoplasma gondii which can infect all warm-blooded animals. As the most common feline definitive host, cats play a vital role in the transmission of T. gondii. However, national estimates of the seroprevalence of T. gondii in cats in mainland China are lacking, and therefore a systematic review and meta-analysis were performed to provide insight into national environmental transmission levels and potential transmission to humans.MethodsStudies published up until July 1, 2016, on T. gondii seroprevalence in cats within mainland China were searched for in CNKI, WanFang, CBM, PubMed, Embase and through the reference lists of resulting articles. The seroprevalence with its 95% confidence interval (CI) for each individual study was presented, and then point estimates and their 95% confidence intervals (CIs) of pooled seroprevalence were calculated. Subgroup analyses were performed according to potential risk factors.ResultsA total of 38 eligible studies, published between 1995 to 2016, covering fifteen provinces and municipalities, and involving 7,285 cats, were included. The seroprevalence in cats per study ranged from 3.9 to 79.4% with a median of 20.3%. As substantial heterogeneity existed among studies, a random-effects model was used to estimate the pooled seroprevalence. The value of the point estimate seroprevalence was 24.5% (95% CI: 20.1–29.0). Seroprevalence in stray cats was significantly higher than in pet cats (OR = 3.00, 95% CI: 1.60–5.64). The seroprevalence increased significantly with cat age (P = 0.018) with 17.4% (95% CI: 7.6–27.2) in the group of ≤ 1 year old, 19.5% (95% CI: 12.7–26.3) in the group of ≤ 3 year-old and 31.6% (95% CI: 22.9–40.3) in the group of > 3 year-old.ConclusionsThe seroprevalence of T. gondii in cats in mainland China was moderate and was associated with cat ownership and age. Due to the increasing prevalence of pet cats in China and the intimate relationship between these cats and humans, this might present a significant exposure risk, particularly for China’s large susceptible population. Therefore, further research is needed into the links between cat ownership and human T. gondii infection and how to reduce T. gondii exposure in humans via cat contacts and the environmental contamination with T. gondii oocysts by cats.
Highlights
Toxoplasmosis is caused by Toxoplasma gondii which can infect all warm-blooded animals
Intermediate hosts can be infected through ingestion of oocysts from the environment, consumption of undercooked meat containing T. gondii tissue cysts [6, 7], or congenitally when parasites in a pregnant women infected with T. gondii for the first time spread to the foetus through the placenta often causing abortion, premature birth, stillbirth, malformation and/or neonatal congenital infection [8]
We identified published studies within the following five bibliographic databases: “toxoplasma gondii” and “cat” in Chinese (“gongxingchong/or gongxingti”, and “mao”, respectively) were used as search terms in the Chinese databases (China National Knowledge Infrastructure (CNKI), WanFang and The Chinese Biomedical Literature Database (CBM)), and “toxoplasma” and “china” and “cats” were MeSH terms in the PubMed online and “toxoplasma” and “china” and “cats” were emtree term-exploded in Embase
Summary
Toxoplasmosis is caused by Toxoplasma gondii which can infect all warm-blooded animals. Toxoplasmosis is caused by the obligate, intracellular protozoan Toxoplasma gondii, a widespread zoonotic parasite which can infect all warm-blooded animals [1], and is one of the most common zoonosis in the world [2]. In 2010 T. gondii was estimated to have caused 10.28 million foodborne illnesses and 0.83 million Disability Adjusted Life Years (DALYs) [14]. These all highlight the global public health importance of this infection in human populations
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