Prevalence of Anti-Yersinia Outer Protein Antibodies in Goats in Lower Saxony

Global Prevalence of Yersinia enterocolitica in Cases of Gastroenteritis: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis

The prevalence of Yersinia enterocolitica in gastroenteritis is often underestimated. It relates considerably to morbidity and medical expenses around the world. Understanding the cause of gastroenteritis leads to making the appropriate treatment decisions. We systematically searched PubMed, Science Direct, Embase, and Scopus to identify all published studies between Jan. 1, 2000, and Dec. 31, 2019, to assess the prevalence of Y. enterocolitica in gastroenteritis patients. A total of 5039 articles were identified that lead to the extraction of data from 47 of them. The pooled prevalence of Y. enterocolitica in cases of gastroenteritis was estimated as 1.97% (1.32–2.74%) in the culture method and 2.41% (1.07–4.22%) in the molecular method. Among the biotypes of Y. enterocolitica, 1A (62.48%) and 1B (2.14%) had the most and least prevalence, respectively. Serotype O3 Y. enterocolitica with 39.46% had the highest and O5,27 with 0.0% had the least prevalence in gastroenteritis cases. In conclusion, the findings of this systematic review show that Y. enterocolitica is prevalent in gastroenteritis in all age groups. Serotypes O3 and O9 of Y. enterocolitica had the highest prevalence and O5,27 had the least prevalence in diarrheal patients. The prevalence of Y. enterocolitica was similar in both gender and different seasons. It should be noted that to determine the role of the organism, more studies are needed especially in food-borne diseases.

Prevalence of Yersinia enterocolitica and Yersinia pseudotuberculosis in wild boars in the Basque Country, northern Spain

Background

Yersiniosis is a zoonosis widely distributed in Europe and swine carry different serotypes of Yersinia enterocolitica and Y. pseudotuberculosis. The aim of this study was to determine the prevalence of Y. enterocolitica and Y. pseudotuberculosis in wild boars in northern Spain. The blood of wild boars (n = 505) was sampled between 2001 and 2012. Seroprevalence was determined in 490 serum samples with an indirect enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay. Seventy-two of the animals were also examined for the presence of Y. enterocolitica or Y. pseudotuberculosis in the tonsils with real-time polymerase chain reaction. All the tonsils were analysed twice, directly and after cold enrichment in phosphate-buffered saline supplemented with 1 % mannitol and 0.15 % bile salts.

Results

Antibodies directed against Y. enterocolitica and Y. pseudotuberculosis were detected in 52.5 % of the animals. Yersinia enterocolitica was detected with real-time polymerase chain reaction in 33.3 % of the wild boars and Y. pseudotuberculosis in 25 %. Significant differences were observed according to the sampling year, and the highest prevalence was during winter and spring. The highest antibody levels and Y.enterocolitica prevalence were observed in mountainous areas at altitudes higher than 600 m, with very cold winters, and with the highest annual rainfall for each dominant climate. Areas with low and medium livestock populations were associated with the highest seroprevalence of Yersinia spp. in wild boars, whereas areas with high ovine populations had the highest prevalence of Y. enterocolitica.

Conclusions

This study shows that Y. enterocolitica and Y. pseudotuberculosis are highly prevalent among wild boars in the Basque country, with Y. enterocolitica most prevalent. The risk of infection among wild boars is influenced by the season and the area in which they live.

Electronic supplementary material

The online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s13028-016-0184-9) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

Yersinia enterocolitica in sheep--a high frequency of biotype 1A

BACKGROUND

Pigs are regarded as the main reservoir for human pathogenic Yersinia enterocolitica, which is dominated by bioserotype 4/O:3. Other animals, including sheep, have occasionally been reported as carriers of pathogenic strains of Y. enterocolitica. To our knowledge, this is the first study performed in the Nordic countries in which the presence of Y. enterocolitica in sheep is investigated.

METHODS

Tonsils and faecal samples collected from sheep slaughtered on the island Gotland (Sweden) from September 2010 through January 2011 were analysed for presence of Y. enterocolitica. In an attempt to maximize recovery, several cultural strategies were applied. Various non-selective media were used and different temperatures and durations of the enrichment were applied before subculturing on Cefsulodin Irgasan Novobiocin (CIN) agar. Presumptive Y. enterocolitica colonies were subjected to urease, API 20E and agglutination test. Yersinia enterocolitica isolates were biotyped, serotyped, and tested for pathogenicity using a TaqMan PCR directed towards the ail-gene that is associated with human pathogenic strains of Y. enterocolitica.

RESULTS

The samples collected from 99 sheep yielded 567 presumptive Y. enterocolitica colonies. Eighty urease positive isolates, from 35 sheep, were identified as Y. enterocolitica by API 20E. Thirty-four of 35 further subtyped Y. enterocolitica isolates, all from faecal samples, belonged to biotype 1A serotype O:5, O:6. O:13,7 and O:10. One strain was Yersinia mollaretii serotype O:62. No human pathogenic strains of Y. enterocolitica were found in the investigated sheep. Other species identified were Y. kristensenii (n = 4), Y. frederiksenii/intermedia (n = 3), Providencia rettgeri (n = 2), Serratia marcescens (n = 1) and Raoultella ornithinolytica (n = 1).

CONCLUSIONS

This study does not support the hypothesis that sheep play an important role in transmission of the known human pathogenic Y. enterocolitica in the studied geographical region. However, because there are studies indicating that some strains of Y. enterocolitica biotype 1A may cause disease in humans, the relative importance of sheep as carriers of human pathogenic strains of Y. enterocolitica remains unclear. Tonsils do not appear to be favourable sites for Y. enterocolitica biotype 1A in sheep.

Prevalence of Yersinia enterocolitica in Goat Herds from Northern Germany

The prevalence of human pathogenic Yersinia enterocolitica isolates in livestock farming is of paramount interest. Raw goat milk has been proposed as a source of human yersiniosis; however, no data on the prevalence of human strains of Y. enterocolitica in goat herds are available. Therefore, fecal samples (n = 575) were collected from 24 goat herds from Lower Saxony, northern Germany. Pre-enrichment in peptone, sorbitol and bile salts broth was followed by plating on cefsuloidin irgasan novobiocin agar. Yersinia enterocolitica was isolated from 17 (3%) samples of five (21%) goat herds. All isolates were biovar 1A, but represented various serovars. PCR assays targeting Yersinia adhesin (yad) gene and the yopT gene, both associated with pathogenicity, produced no amplification products. Therefore, the isolates can be regarded as opportunistic apathogenic bacteria. Consequently, milk, cheese or meat from goats should not be considered as an important source for human yersiniosis.

Seroprevalence of Anti-Yersinia Antibodies in Healthy Austrians

Yersiniosis is caused by Y. enterocolitica and Y. pseudotuberculosis mostly presenting as intestinal infection. The infection is usually acquired from contaminated food. The aim of this study was to determine the seroprevalence of anti-Yersinia antibodies in Austrians. Sera of 750 healthy Austrians from all nine states were tested for anti-Yersinia IgG antibodies using the recomBlot Yersinia Westernblot kit. Overall seroprevalence was 29.7%. Seroprevalence increased significantly with age from 24.7% in the group of the 19 to 24 year olds to 38.5% in the group of persons older than 44 years. The seroprevalence of anti-Yersinia antibodies varied within the states between 18% and 43.5%. The high seroprevalence of anti-Yersinia antibodies in contrast to only approximately 100 reported yersiniosis cases per year points to the fact that the majority of infections is either subclinical or mild.