Molecular Detection of Pathogens in Ticks Infesting Camels in Matrouh Governorate, Egypt

Abstract

Tick-borne pathogens become healthy important as the incidence of tick-borne diseases increases and the geographic areas in which they are found expand. A relatively little information is available on ticks infesting camels in Matrouh Governorate, Egypt, and the role of ticks as disease vectors. Thus rendering PCR assay the only viable alternative to demonstrate their presence. For this purpose, a surveillance was carried out from May 2011 to April 2013 to identify ticks parasitize camels, and tested part of them for the presence of parasitic, rickettsial and bacterial pathogens using specific primers targeting fragments of their genes. Out of 249 studied camels, 212 (85.14%) were infested by five species of ticks that increased in numbers during dry seasons. Hyalomma dromedarii was the predominant tick species (73.65%), followed by H. rufipes (12.03%), H. truncatum (6.62%), and low numbers were H. anatolicum excavatum (4.73%), and H. impeltatum (1.62%), besides 1.35% were belong to other species. PCR results revealed that the majority of samples were found co-infected with at least five pathogens. It evidenced the presence of Trypanosoma evansi, Trypanosoma brucei, Babesia bovis, Babesia bigemina, Theileria camelensis and Anaplasma marginale. Borrelia burgdorferi, Rickettsial DNA, and Theileria annulata were absent. Pasteurella multocida, Histophilus somni and Mycoplasma sp. were detected in ticks DNAs, but not known if transmitted by ticks or not. We conclude that several pathogens are present in ticks in this area, phylogeny is required in order to validate the PCR results, and special attention should be given to tick control programs.