Population_genomic_evidence_that_human_and_animal_infections_in_Africa_come_from_the_same_populations_of_Dracunculus_medinensis-sc-5956
Population_genomic_evidence_that_human_and_animal_infections_in_Africa_come_from_the_same_populations_of_Dracunculus_medinensis
Background: Guinea worm – Dracunculus medinensis – was historically one of the major parasites of humans and has been known since antiquity. Now, Guinea worm is on the brink of eradication, as efforts to interrupt transmission have reduced the annual burden of disease from millions of infections per year in the 1980s to only 30 human cases reported globally last year. Despite the enormous success of eradication efforts to date, one complication has arisen. Over the last few years, hundreds of dogs have been found infected with this previously apparently anthroponotic parasite, almost all in Chad. Moreover, the relative numbers of infections in humans and dogs (15 and 817, respectively, in 2017), suggests that dogs may be key in maintaining transmission in that country.  Results: In an effort to shed light on this peculiar epidemiology of Guinea worm in Chad, we have sequenced and compared the genomes of worms from dog, human and other animal infections. Confirming previous work with other molecular markers, we show that all of these worms are D. medinensis, and that the same population of worms are causing both infections, can confirm the suspected transmission between host species and detect signs of a population bottleneck due to the eradication efforts. The diversity of worms in Chad appears to exclude the possibility that there were no, or very few, worms present in the country during a 10-year absence of reported cases.  Conclusions: This work reinforces the importance of adequate surveillance of both human and dog populations in the Guinea worm eradication campaign and suggests that control programs should stay aware of the possible emergence of unusual epidemiology as they approach elimination. This data is part of a pre-publication release. For information on the proper use of pre-publication data shared by the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute (including details of any publication moratoria), please see http://www.sanger.ac.uk/datasharing/
Sequencing and comparing the genomes of guinea worm samples from dog, human and other animal infections.