Prevalence of Leptospirosis among Rice mill Workers in Tiruchirapalli, South India

ABSTRACT

Leptospirosis is one of the emerging and re-emerging neglected tropical bacterial infections, greater attention from the public health and medical communities. Due to increase in urbanization and conversion of rural setup to urban, poor sanitation and unawareness of the risk sources, there is an increase in the new cases every year. Methods: The present investigation is aimed to assess the presence of leptospirosis among rice mill workers by socio-demographic data, information related to disease, symptoms, animal contact, cleaning procedures and determine the presence of leptospires seroprints by genus specific enzyme linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) and serovar specific microscopic agglutination test (MAT). Results & Conclusion: The Genus specific IgG ELISA was performed for all the serum samples (n=107) and the results were compared with serovar specific MAT by using serial doubling dilutions of serum samples. The results of ELISA showed reactive to 44 samples whereas, MAT showed positive to 32. In MAT, the highest titer value was 1320 for L. australis and L. grippotyphosa followed by 1160 for L. autumnalis, L. canicola, L. icterohaemorrhagiae, L. javanica, L. pomona and L. patoc. Screening of this occupational risk group was carried out for the presence of leptospiral seroprints in order to provide appropriate medical check-up and early treatment. Significantly higher prevalence rates in rice mill workers compared to control group is identified, indicating that working in the rice mill is a significant risk factor for leptospiral infection.