Cattle and Wild Animals Leptospirosis as an Example for the Importance of one Health Approach

During the summer of 2018 the ministry of health reported on an outbreak of leptospirosis among people with a history of hiking and swimming in several streams and pools at the Golan-heights. Simultaneously, samples from two beef cattle herds reporting of an abnormal acute abortion storm were found to be seropositive to leptospirosis in a Micro Agglutination Test (MAT). Results revealed possible exposure to several serovars but only L. pomona serovar was consistently found in all the sera samples taken. During the last 4 years L. pomona has been reported from several dairy and beef cattle herds in Israel. However, it has not been reported in the Golan Heights until the summer of 2018. Following the outbreak, a serology study was conducted, among free grazing beef cattle and wild boars surrounding the streams to which human cases where exposed. 735 animals from 25 beef cattle groups and 21 wild boars were tested by a MAT for L. pomona. Data on location, type of water source, number of animals, age and pregnancy status were collected for each cattle group. Among the positive beef cattle groups seroprevalence ranged between 3%-90%. Bulls originated from highly infected territories and where moved on 1^st of june 2018, where sera negative, suggesting introduction to the bacteria to these region after this date. The prevalence of exposure among the beef cattle was 8 times more in beef cattle grazing in territories with natural water source such as streams and springs (Prevalance ratio: 8.05 C.I 95 4.46-14.51). Among the wild boar 7 (33%) were found to be seropositive. Geographic locations of beef and wild boars positive cases, suggest a possible link to the human cases. Our results emphasizes the importance of monitoring of farm and wild animals as a sentinels and possible source for human leptospirosis.