Seroprevalence of leptospirosis among slaughtered cattle in Thrissur, Kerala

Abstract

Leptospirosis is anunderdiagnosed bacterial anthropozoonotic disease that is considered as a major public health concern in India. The present study was conducted to detect the presence of antibodies against different leptospiral serovars in slaughtered cattle in Thrissur. A total of 165 blood samples were collected from slaughtered cattle of two slaughterhouses viz., Meat Technology Unit (MTU), KVASU, Mannuthy (n=85) and Thrissur Municipal Slaughterhouse (TMS), Thrissur (n=80). The serum samples from the slaughtered cattle were subjected to Microscopic Agglutination Test (MAT). The overall occurrence of leptospirosis from both the slaughterhouses was 44.42 per cent. A seropositivity of 37.65 and 51.25 per cent in slaughtered cattle respectively were found by MAT from samples collected from MTU, Mannuthy and TMS, Thrissur. The predominant serovars detected in slaughtered cattle were Sejroe (28.76 per cent), Grippotyphosa (21.91 per cent) and Australis (15.06 per cent).The results revealed that the apparently healthy slaughtered cattle had been exposed to leptospirosis and could act as a source of infection to the slaughterhouse workers.

Keywords

• leptospirosis
• slaughtered cattle
• microscopic agglutination test (mat)