The Presence of Leptospira species in Bats

Claudia Jenai, Yeong (2018) The Presence of Leptospira species in Bats. [Final Year Project Report] (Unpublished)

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Abstract

Leptospirosis is one of the recognized zoonotic diseases that occurs typically in tropical region such as Malaysia. This disease is caused by pathogenic Leptospira, a Gram-negative bacterium that is commonly harboured in kidneys of mammals such as rodents, bats, dogs and cattle. The increase of leptospirosis cases in Sarawak over the years has created an urgency to study the transmission of Leptospira from animals to human. There is not much studies have been done regarding bats as one of the reservoirs for Leptospira in Sarawak. Hence, the aim of this study is to detect the presence of Leptospira species in bats from selected areas in Sarawak using Ellinghausen-McCullogh-Johnson-Harris (EMJH) media with 5-fluorouracil and Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR) method. The urine of bats was cultured in EMJH media and incubated at 28 C for 12 weeks. The genomic extraction was conducted using Wizard Genomic DNA purification kit Polymerase Chain Reaction was used to detect the presence of pathogenic, saprophytic and intermediate Leptospira using three sets of specific primers to target LipL32, J6S rRNA and rrs genes respectively. A total sample of 56 bats were captured from Mount Lesung National Park and Bungo Range, Sarawak. 37.5% (21/56) of the samples were found to be positive intermediate Leptospira whereas 39.3% (22/56) of the samples are positive saprophytic Leptospira. From this study, 43 Leptospira species were isolated. Based on DNA sequencing, the most distributed saprophytic Leptospira species and intermediate Leptospira species in this study are Leptospira biflexa and Leptospira fainei respectively. The findings indicated that bats are one of the reservoirs for Leptospira species and preventive measure should be taken.

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