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Molecular identification of Leishmania tropica in mammals occurring in human-inhabited areas of a cutaneous leishmaniasis endemic focus in North-West Pakistan

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Abstract

Cutaneous Leishmaniasis is endemic in the tribal district of Khyber near the Pak-Afghan border and is caused by Leishmania tropica. In Pakistan, cutaneous leishmaniasis caused by L. tropica is considered anthroponotic and is thought to be maintained by a human-sand fly-human transmission cycle. Along with humans, other mammals may also be acting as reservoir hosts of leishmaniasis in the study area. To investigate the role of non-human mammals in the transmission of leishmaniasis, blood samples were collected from 245 animals from the CL endemic district of Khyber, Pakistan. Leishmania parasite in these samples was detected by amplifying the species-specific sequences in minicircle kinetoplast DNA, using PCR. L. tropica DNA was detected in 18 (7.35%) samples, comprising 11 cows (Bos taurus), 6 goats (Capra hircus), and 1 dog (Canus lupus familiaris). Only a single cow and dog had a leishmaniasis-like lesion, and the remaining positive samples were asymptomatic. None of the tested sheep (Ovis aries) and rat (Rattus rattus, Rattus norvegicus) was positive. The present study reports the first instance of molecular detection of L. tropica in domestic animals. Our study indicates that along with humans’ cows, goats and dogs may also be playing an important role in the transmission of anthroponotic cutaneous leishmaniasis in district Khyber in particular and Pakistan in general.

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Acknowledgements

The authors are also thankful to Habib Afridi and Waris Shah for helping in sampling from various villages and also to the locals of the study area for cooperating in the sampling process.

Funding

The project is funded by the Higher Education Commission of Pakistan under the National Research Program for Universities project No. 4135.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Vector Biology and Entomology Section, Institute of Zoological Sciences, University of Peshawar, Peshawar, Pakistan

    Syed Basit Rasheed & Muhammad Zahir Shah

  2. Government Degree College, Jamrud, Khyber, Pakistan

    Muhammad Zahir Shah

  3. Parasitology and Tropical Disease Section, Institute of Zoological Sciences, University of Peshawar, Peshawar, Pakistan

    Qaisar Jamal

Authors
  1. Syed Basit Rasheed
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  2. Muhammad Zahir Shah
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  3. Qaisar Jamal
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Contributions

Syed Basit Rasheed along with supervision, conceived and designed the project and wrote the article. The article is part of Muhammad Zahir Shah PhD thesis who collected the samples, carried out lab work and wrote the article. Qaisar Jamal helped in lab work and analysis of data and reviewed the article.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Syed Basit Rasheed.

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Ethical approval

All the processes and procedures for the collection of blood from vertebrates were approved by the Ethical Committee of the Faculty of Life and Environmental Sciences, University of Peshawar under certificate no. 12/EC/F.LIFE-2020.

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Not applicable.

Competing interests

The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.

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Section Editor: Nawal Hijjawi

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Rasheed, S.B., Shah, M.Z. & Jamal, Q. Molecular identification of Leishmania tropica in mammals occurring in human-inhabited areas of a cutaneous leishmaniasis endemic focus in North-West Pakistan. Parasitol Res 123, 5 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00436-023-08025-9

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00436-023-08025-9

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