Fox Naomi J, Caldow George L, Liebeschuetz Hilary, Stevenson Karen, Hutchings Michael R
Scotland's Rural College (SRUC), Edinburgh, UK.
Shetland Islands Council, Lerwick, UK.
Vet Rec. 2018 Jun 2;182(22):634. doi: 10.1136/vr.104638. Epub 2018 Feb 14.
Paratuberculosis (Johne's disease) is caused by the bacterium subspecies (). Achieving herd-level control of mycobacterial infection is notoriously difficult, despite widespread adoption of test-and-cull-based control strategies. The presence of infection in wildlife populations could be contributing to this difficulty. Rabbits are naturally infected with the same strain as cattle, and can excrete high levels in their faeces. The aim of this study is to determine if implementation of paratuberculosis control in cattle leads to a decline in infection levels in rabbits. An island-wide, test-and-cull-based paratuberculosis control programme was initiated on a Scottish island in 2008. In this study annual tests were obtained from 15 cattle farms, from 2008 to 2011, totalling 2609 tests. Rabbits (1564) were sampled from the 15 participating farms, from 2008 to 2011, and was detected by faecal culture. seroprevalence in cattle decreased from 16 to 7.2 per cent, while prevalence in rabbits increased from 10.3 to 20.3 per cent. Results indicate that efforts to control paratuberculosis in cattle do not reduce levels in sympatric rabbits. This adds to mounting evidence that if becomes established in wild rabbit populations, rabbits represent a persistent and widespread source of infection, potentially impeding livestock control strategies.
副结核病（约内氏病）由副结核分枝杆菌亚种（）引起。尽管广泛采用基于检测和扑杀的控制策略，但实现畜群水平的分枝杆菌感染控制非常困难。野生动物种群中存在感染可能是造成这一困难的原因之一。兔子自然感染与牛相同的菌株，并且能在粪便中大量排出。本研究的目的是确定在牛群中实施副结核病控制是否会导致兔子感染水平下降。2008年在苏格兰一个岛屿上启动了一项全岛范围的、基于检测和扑杀的副结核病控制计划。在本研究中，从2008年到2011年，从15个养牛场获取了年度检测样本，共计2609份检测。从2008年到2011年，从15个参与的农场中对兔子（1564只）进行了采样，并通过粪便培养检测到。牛的血清阳性率从16%下降到7.2%，而兔子的患病率从10.3%上升到20.3%。结果表明，控制牛群副结核病的努力并未降低同域兔子中的感染水平。这进一步证明，如果在野兔种群中确立，兔子是持续且广泛的感染源，可能会阻碍家畜控制策略。
