Abstract
The mountainous and foothill areas, in which the city of Zakopane, the capital of Tatra County, is located are characterized by continuous weather changes, lower air temperature, persistent snow cover, and poorer vegetation than in the lowlands. Ixodes ricinus and Ixodes hexagonus are vectors of tick-borne diseases and play an important role in the persistence of tick-borne diseases. The aim of the study was to determine the risk of exposure of domestic cats and dogs to the attacks of Ixodid ticks, to tick-borne infections with Borrelia burgdorferi sensu lato, Anaplasma phagocytophilum, Babesia microti and Toxoplasma gondii in the city of Zakopane and the surrounding area. In 2017–2018 ticks were collected from a total of 10 domestic cats and 88 domestic dogs. Selected pathogens of tick-borne diseases were detected by PCR and nested PCR. The study material contained 119 I. ricinus and 36 I. hexagonus. The molecular examinations showed the presence of A. phagocytophilum in 3.8%, B. microti in 24.5% and T. gondii in 4.5% of the all ticks. In addition, in the study area, there is a high potential risk of tick-borne infection by B. microti, and a low potential risk of exposure to A. phagocytophilum and T. gondii infection.
Highlights
The geographical location of Zakopane, numerous tourist and walking routes, a large number of wooden architecture monuments, landscape diversity, and climatic and medicinal values are undoubtedly the advantages of the city, which is visited by more and more tourists from Poland, Europe and all over the world every year
Protozoa of B. microti and T. gondii were reported in both tick species
The coexistence of A. phagocytophilum and B. microti, as well as A. phagocytophilum and T. gondii was demonstrated in I. ricinus females (Table 1)
Summary
The geographical location of Zakopane, numerous tourist and walking routes, a large number of wooden architecture monuments, landscape diversity, and climatic and medicinal values are undoubtedly the advantages of the city, which is visited by more and more tourists from Poland, Europe and all over the world every year. It is known that Ixodes ricinus (Linnaeus, 1758) is the most common among the 19 tick species found in the Polish fauna. The second tick species widespread throughout Europe, and probably in Poland is Ixodes hexagonus (Leach, 1815), which feeds mainly on hedgehogs, weasels, foxes and domestic dogs[4,5,6,7]. Like I. ricinus, the tick can be a vector and/or reservoir of many pathogens, e.g. B_burgdorferi s. In Poland, these domestic animals are mainly attacked by five species, i.e. I_ricinus, Ixodes crenulatus (Koch, 1844), I. hexagonus, Ixodes rugicollis (Schulze and Schlottke, 1929) and Dermacentor reticulatus (Fabricius, 1794)[9]. L. and A. phagocytophilum, as well as to the infection of Babesia microti and Toxoplasma gondii in the selected areas of Tatra County. The approach of gathering data on the distribution of (zoonotic) vector-borne diseases through a veterinary survey is consistent with the ‘One Health’ concept[10]
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