title: Prevalence of Rickettsia felis in the fleas Ctenocephalides felis felis and Ctenocephalides canis from two Indian villages in Sao Paulo Municipality, Brazil.
abstract: We evaluated the presence of Rickettsia infection among fleas collected on domestic dogs in two Guarani Indian communities in the suburban area of São Paulo Municipality, Brazil. A total of 114 Ctenocephalides felis felis and 47 Ctenocephalides canis were collected from 40 dogs. A total of 41 C. felis felis (36.0%) and 9 C. canis (19.1%) fleas yielded expected bands by PCR, which were all shown by DNA sequencing to be indentical to the corresponding sequence of a fragment of the Rickettsia felis gltA gene deposited in GenBank. The overall prevalence of R. felis was 31.0% (49/161).
authors.affiliation: Faculdade de Medicina Veterinária e Zootecnia, Universidade de São Paulo, Av. Prof. Dr. Orlando Marques de Paiva, 87, São Paulo, Brazil, 05508-270. maurivet@yahoo.com
authors.forename: Mauricio C
authors.initials: MC
authors.lastname: Horta
authors.forename: Daniela P
authors.initials: DP
authors.lastname: Chiebao
authors.forename: Daniele B
authors.initials: DB
authors.lastname: de Souza
authors.forename: Fernando
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Ferreira
authors.forename: Sônia R
authors.initials: SR
authors.lastname: Pinheiro
authors.forename: Macelo B
authors.initials: MB
authors.lastname: Labruna
authors.forename: Teresinha T S
authors.initials: TT
authors.lastname: Schumaker
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D001938:Brazil; D004285:Dogs / Q000469:parasitology; D006801:Humans; D041161:Rickettsia felis / Q000235:genetics / Q000302:isolation & purification*; D012424:Rural Population; D005423:Siphonaptera / Q000382:microbiology*