Historical geographic overlap of human rickettsiosis with animal reservoirs in Juiz de Fora, Minas Gerais, Brazil

• Autor(a) principal: Monteiro, Rafael Veríssimo
• Data de Publicação: 2022
• Outros Autores: de Castro Jr, José Geraldo, Maturano, Ralph, Chame, Marcia
• Tipo de documento: Artigo
• Idioma: eng; por
• Título da fonte: Revista de Epidemiologia e Controle de Infecção
• Texto Completo: https://online.unisc.br/seer/index.php/epidemiologia/article/view/17039

Background and objectives: we investigated the existence of a historical geographic overlap between the location of spotted fever group rickettsiosis human cases, a disease caused by the gram-negative bacterium Rickettsia sp., and that of mammalian reservoirs, specifically domestic horses and capybaras, in the urban perimeter of the city of Juiz de Fora, Minas Gerais, Brazil. Methods: cases of human rickettsiosis that occurred during a period of 17 years (2003-2020) were geolocated and the distribution of cases in time and geographic space was assessed using 1st and 2nd order geospatial association indicators. We also analyzed the overlap between the locations of human rickettsiosis cases and the area of occurrence of domestic horses and capybaras. Results: men were diagnosed more often than women, but a large proportion of affected women died. The results indicate an aggregation of human rickettsiosis cases in time (cases tend to occur close to each other at each epidemic event) and in geographic space (cases are concentrated in a specific geographic region of the urban perimeter). Human cases seem to be more associated with city regions with: i) higher local frequency of domestic horses and not capybaras; ii) lower rates of family development. Conclusion: it is suggested that, in the local epidemiological scenario, domestic horses appear to be the main sources of the rickettsia infecting humans, not capybaras.