Query fever or coxiellosis is a serious bacterial infection caused by Coxiella burnetii and affects various animals and humans. Clinically, Q fever is ranged from various degrees of fever to abortion either in infected animals or humans. Such infection has a special importance in cattle and small ruminants industry particularly in sheep and goats. Thus, the current study aimed to recognize the current situation of the prevalence of specific antibodies against C. burnetii in serum of sheep and goat from Sohag governorate, Egypt, using a commercially available ELISA. The overall seroprevalence was found against C. burnetii (25.6%; 56/219) subdivided as 22.8% (23/101) in sheep and 28% (33/118) in goats. Animals used for this study are representative to different small ruminants (sheep and goat), age (var-ious ages), sexes (male and females), locations (different localities from Sohag), physiological and pathological conditions and many other factors related to animals, farm, and environment. Female animals exhibited a higher rate of C. burnetii antibodies than male ones (P = 0.0637). Also, females in dry period showed higher seropositive rate than those of pregnant females (P < 0.0001). In addition, breeding system was reported as a risk factor for infection, because animals bred in small holders demonstrated lower prevalence rate than those reared in individual breeding (P = 0.010) and mass farming (P = 0.006). Clinical and biochemical variables were estimated to recognize the health impact of seropositivity. Seropositive animals exhibited marked alterations in the selected clinical parameters and alanine transaminase (ALT) compared to the seronegative ones. Determining the exact situation of occurrence of Q fever in sheep and goats might assist in developing control policy for this infection and thus improve the income of small ruminants industry and protect human from infection.
Key words: Q fever; Coxiella burnetii; ELISA; Antibodies; Egypt; Ruminants
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