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The Mechanism of Transmission of Haemobartonella muris (Mayer) of Rats by the Spined Rat Louse, Polyplax spinulosa (Burmeister)

1958; American Society of Parasitologists; Volume: 44; Issue: 6 Linguagem: Inglês

10.2307/3274543

1937-2345

Maxwell M. Crystal,

Mosquito-borne diseases and control

Normal adult albino rats infected with Haemobartonella muris (Mayer) show no evidence of disease. However, splenectomy results in a severe, often fatal, anemia of the macrocytic hypochromic type. Ford and Eliot (1928) first suggested transmission of the disease by an insect vector when they noted that all of their rats were infested with the spined rat louse, Polyplax spinulosa (Burmeister). A few months later, Cannon and McClelland (1928, 1929) showed that lice could transmit H. muris directly from rats with latent infections to uninfected rats. Mayer (1928b) achieved similar results independently and there was further confirmation by Eliot and Ford (1929) and Vassiliadis (1930). The first attempt to determine the mechanism of transmission by lice was made by Eliot and Ford (1929). They fed 10 lice to a splenectomized Wistar rat which remained uninfected after 3 months of observation. It was not reported whether these lice came from an infected source. They also tested transmission by the bites of the vectors. They placed lice from infected animals on splenectomized bartonellafree rats which subsequently developed typical anemias. Similarly, Timmerman (1930) transferred lice from an infected rat to a splenectomized white rat but allowed them to feed through muslin. This rat later became positive. Modes of transmission other than by the bite were not excluded in these experiments. Consequently, a study was initiated to determine more precisely the mechanism of transmission.