Paramyxoviruses are a highly abundant and diverse viral group with public and veterinary health relevance. Our study aimed to identify and characterise paramyxoviruses in putative small mammal reservoirs in South Africa, including insectivorous bats, rodents, shrews and sengis.
Species of the widely distributed and populous rodent genus Rhabdomys, endemic to southern Africa, were found to...
Lassa virus (LASV) is a hemorrhagic fever-causing Arenavirus endemic in Western Africa. Up to 5000 deaths per year are attributed to infections with this rodent-borne pathogen.
The main rodent reservoir is the multimammate mouse Mastomys natalensis a commensal rodent found throughout Sub-Saharan Africa. However, in recent years several other rodent species have been identified as...
Data regarding the occurrence of Staphylococcus (S.) aureus in wild living animals is rare. The aim of this study was to provide insights into the occurrence and characteristics of S. aureus in ungulates from Brandenburg, Germany.
Nasal swabs of wild boars, roe, fallow and red deer were collected in hunting season 2021/2022 and analyzed for S. aureus by selective enrichment. Species were...
Infection with the hepatitis E virus (HEV) can cause liver inflammation in humans. The zoonotic HEV genotype 3 is endemic in Germany and can be transmitted by ingesting insufficiently cooked wild boar meat. To evaluate the risk associated with consumption of game meat, wild boar liver samples from 28 hunting areas in Brandenburg were collected between 2018 and 2022 within the framework of the...
Rat hepatitis E virus (ratHEV) is distantly related to the well-studied human-pathogenic HEV genotypes 1-4 and distributed in rats worldwide. Recently, ratHEV infection has been demonstrated in several hepatitis cases in human patients from Hongkong, Canada and Spain. To characterize rat- and human-derived ratHEV strains in more detail, we generated genomic plasmids, which were in-vitro...