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PREVALENCE OF ANAPLASMA PHAGOCYTOPHILA AND BORRELIA BURGDORFERI IN IXODES PERSULCATUS TICKS FROM NORTHEASTERN CHINA

A total of 1,345 Ixodes persulcatus ticks collected from northeastern China were investigated for the presence of Anaplasma phagocytophila and Borrelia burgdorferi by a nested polymerase chain reaction (PCR). Sixty-two (4.6%) ticks were positive for A. phagocytophila and 454 (33.8%) were positive for B. burgdorferi. Seven (0.5%) were coinfected with both agents. Sequence analysis of 919-basepair PCR amplicons revealed three types of A. phagocytophila. Type 1 was identical to the published sequences of A. phagocytophilas responsible for human granulocytic ehrlichiosis (HGE). The other two variants differed from the HGE agent sequence at one and four positions, respectively. These findings imply that infection with A. phagocytophila poses a potential health threat to both humans and animals in northeastern China, and that ehrlichiosis should be considered in the differential diagnosis of febrile patients with a history of tick bite, particularly when clinical manifestations are atypical for Lyme disease.

Received June 20, 2002. Accepted for publication January 3, 2003.

Acknowledgments: We are grateful to Dr. Rong-man Xu for identifying ticks and reading the manuscript, and to Dr. Jian-hua Zhu and Dr. Shan-hu Chen (The Central Anti-Epidemic Station of the Great Xingan Mountains) for assistance in collection of ticks.

Financial support: This study was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (grant no. 39970655) and the Beijing Natural Science Foundation (grant no. 7992029).

Authors’ addresses: Wu-Chun Cao, Qiu-Min Zhao, Pan-He Zhang, Hong Yang, Xiao-Ming Wu, Bo-Hai Wen, and Xi-Tan Zhang, Beijing Institute of Microbiology and Epidemiology, 20 Dong-Da-Jie Street, Fengtai District, Beijing 100071, People’s Republic of China. J. Dik F. Habbema, Center for Decision Sciences in Tropical Disease Control, Department of Public Health, Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences, Erasmus University Rotterdam, PO Box 1738, 3000 DR Rotterdam, The Netherlands.

Reprint requests: Dr. Wu-Chun Cao, Beijing Institute of Microbiology and Epidemiology, 20 Dong-Da-Jie Street, Fengtai District, Beijing 100071, People’s Republic of China, Telephone/Fax: 86-10-63812060, E-mail: caowc{at}nic.bmi.ac.cn

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