The prevalence of human Brucellosis in Mazandaran province, Iran

Abstract

Brucellosis is a bacterial infectious disease shared between human and livestock caused by a bacterium of the genus Brucella. This disease is generally transmitted to human through direct contact with an infectious animal, drinking unpasteurized milk or milk products. Symptoms include weakness, lethargy, chills, fever, sweating, decreased appetite, headache, back pain and psychological symptoms; and the main cause of death is mainly endocarditic. This study was conducted with the aim to diagnose Brucellosisseroepidemiology in people referred to health and medical centers of Mazandaran province during 2010. Blood samples were taken from participants and after centrifugation and separation of serum, all the received samples first underwent Wright Tube Agglutination test and the samples of Wright tube test with negative or low titers of antibody were used for identifying Blukay antibodies of Standard Coombs Wright Test. To determine whether or not the disease is motile, 2ME Wright Test and Elisa were also conducted. During this study, 337 participants were found positive for Brucellosis. Of these, 25.72% lives in the city and 74.28% is in rural areas. Also, 54.37% were male and 45.63% female. Brucellosis is an important re-emerging zoonosis with a worldwide distribution and it’s still an uncontrolled serious public health problem in many developing countries including Iran. Key words: Human Brucellosis, prevalence, Mazandaran, Iran.