Four North American and two European species of Ixodes ticks harbor borreliae Three of the North American species--Ixodes dammini, Ixodes scapularis, and Ixodes pacificus--and two Old World species--Ixodes ricinus and Ixodes persulcatus--feed on a wide range of hosts, including humans; the North American Ixodes dentatus has a predilection for cottontail rabbits and rarely parasitizes humans In Lyme disease foci in North America where I dammini is common, Borrelia burgdorferi or similar types of spirochetes have been cultured from 10 species of wild or domestic mammals and from one species of songbird The prevalence of infected rodents is remarkably high (greater than or equal to 75%) in these foci Several different antigenic variants of B burgdorferi have been cultured Initial isolates of B burgdorferi in North America were remarkably homogeneous, but documentation of different variants is increasing The association of different antigenic variants with diseases in humans and domestic animals needs to be clarified

Epizootiology of Borrelia in Ixodes tick vectors and reservoir hosts.

Social and environmental changes may alter the prevalence of disease.’ Lyme disease,2 which is caused by the tick-vectored spirochete Borrelia burgdorferi,’-5 was first reported in the United States in 1970.6 By the mid-I980s, hundreds of cases annually were documented in some northeastern states7 Reasons for this significant increase in disease will be reviewed here through discussion of the host animals for Ixodes dammini, the historical evidence of ticks in northeastern forests, and the vertebrate reservoirs of B. burgdorferi. Additionally, I shall report on the borreliae infecting rabbits and their ticks, Ixodes dentatus.

Mammalian and avian reservoirs for Borrelia burgdorferi.

Horse reservoir for Borrelia burgdorferi

Members of 18 species of ticks, mosquitoes, horse flies, and deer flies were collected in southeastern Connecticut and tested by indirect fluorescent-antibody staining methods for Borrelia burgdorferi, the etiologic agent of Lyme disease. An infection rate of 36.2% (116 tested), recorded for immature Ixodes dammini, exceeded positivity values for all other arthropod species. Prevalence of infection for hematophagous insects ranged from 2.9% of 105 Hybomitra lasiophthalma to 14.3% of seven Hybomitra epistates. Infected I. dammini larvae and nymphs coexisted with infected Dermacentor variabilis (American dog tick) immatures on white-footed mice (Peromyscus leucopus), but unlike I. dammini, none of the 55 adult American dog ticks collected from vegetation harbored B. burgdorferi. Groups of 113 field-collected mosquitoes of Aedes canadensis and 43 Aedes stimulans were placed in cages with uninfected Syrian hamsters. Of these, 11 females of both species contained B. burgdorferi and had fed fully or partially from the hamsters. No spirochetes were isolated from the hamsters, but antibodies were produced in one test animal.

Ticks and biting insects infected with the etiologic agent of Lyme disease, Borrelia burgdorferi.

When Christopher Columbus crossed the Atlantic Ocean in 1492, he brought together two worlds of infection which had developed in virtual isolation from each other for thousands of years. The picture of infectious disease in the New World differed from that in the Old World in many ways, but probably most dramatically in the absence or near absence of crowd infections capable of causing severe epidemics. The devastating effects of these crowd diseases in the post-Columbian period are well known, with conditions such as smallpox, diphtheria, measles, malaria, bubonic plague, yellow fever, and possibly typhus killing thousands of Native Americans, thus allowing inhabitants of the eastern hemisphere to become firmly established in the western hemisphere. Less is known about the diseases present in the Americas prior to 1492, but they probably included treponemal infections (pinta and syphilis), tuberculosis, forms of leishmaniasis and trypanosomiasis, fungal diseases such as coccidioidomycosis and paracoccidioidomycosis, various coccal infections, Rocky Mountain spotted fever, Lyme disease, legionellosis, hydatid disease, and a variety of intestinal parasite infections. It must be noted, however, that some of these syndromes were likely already present in both hemispheres in 1492. Recent research suggests that adult rheumatoid arthritis may also have its origin in the Americas. © 1992 Wiley-Liss, Inc.

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1002/ajpa.1330350603

A new world of infectious disease

Twelve of 50 randomly selected horses from areas endemic for Borrelia burgdorferi had indirect fluorescent antibody titers of 1:8 to 1:2,048 against B burgdorferi. One of 50 horses from nonendemic areas had a titer of 1:8. This difference in the number of horses seropositive for B burgdorferi (P less than 0.002) and our finding that seropositive horses did not have agglutinating antibodies against potentially cross-reacting Leptospira spp indicated that horses in endemic areas were exposed to B burgdorferi and that the spirochete induced an antibody response in the horses.

Antibodies to Borrelia burgdorferi in New England horses: serologic survey.

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Antibodies to Borrelia burgdorferi in New England horses: serologic survey.