Abe T, Yamaki K, Hayakawa T, Fukuda H, Ito Y, Kume H, Komiya T, Ishihara K, Hirai K
Second Department of Internal Medicine, Nagoya University School of Medicine, Japan.
Eur J Epidemiol. 2001;17(11):1029-32. doi: 10.1023/a:1020018907452.
The causative agent of Q fever, a widespread zoonotic disease, is the bacteria Coxiella burnetii. Although cases of Q fever have been documented in countries throughout the world, the prevalence of the disease in Japan is not yet known. Q fever is a demonstrated occupational hazard to those employed in zoological professions, but the risk to Japanese veterinarians has not yet been quantified. In order to evaluate the risk to Japanese veterinarians, we performed a serological survey using serum samples from 267 veterinarians. Two control groups consisting of 352 medical workers and 2003 healthy blood donors were also evaluated. The antibody titers of the serum samples were measured by indirect immunofluorescence assay (IFA) using phase II C. burnetii Nine Mile strain as the antigen. The positive rate of IgG antibody was 13.5% in the veterinarians, which was higher than in the blood donors (3.6%, p < 0.001) and medical workers (5.1 %,p < 0.001). These findings suggest that Japanese veterinarians have a higher risk of infection by C. burnetii than other members of the Japanese population. An interesting finding of this study was that positive rates of IgG and IgM antibodies in the blood donor group were higher in younger individuals. The IgM antibody positive rate was the highest in females under 30 years old.
Q热是一种广泛传播的人畜共患病，其病原体是伯氏考克斯体细菌。尽管世界各国均有Q热病例的记录，但日本该病的流行情况尚不清楚。Q热已被证明对从事动物学相关职业的人员存在职业危害，但日本兽医面临的风险尚未量化。为评估日本兽医面临的风险，我们使用267名兽医的血清样本进行了血清学调查。还对由352名医护人员和2003名健康献血者组成的两个对照组进行了评估。血清样本的抗体滴度通过间接免疫荧光法（IFA）测定，以II期伯氏考克斯体九里株作为抗原。兽医中IgG抗体阳性率为13.5%，高于献血者（3.6%，p<0.001）和医护人员（5.1%，p<0.001）。这些发现表明，日本兽医感染伯氏考克斯体的风险高于日本其他人群。本研究一个有趣的发现是，献血者组中IgG和IgM抗体的阳性率在较年轻个体中更高。IgM抗体阳性率在30岁以下女性中最高。
