Seroprevalence and Molecular Detection of Toxoplasma gondii Isolates from Goats in Semi Arid Region of India

Goat husbandry is contributing significantly to the agri-based economy of India. Besides the wide acceptability of goat meat cutting religious barriers, the demand for goat milk and milk products are growing. Toxoplasma gondii is one of the most important infectious causes for reproductive failure, fetal resorption, abortion, stillbirth and neonatal mortality in small ruminants. Further, infectious abortion in a doe herd caused by Toxoplasma gondii is of public health concern because of its zoonotic nature. In absence of authentic data on prevalence of toxoplasma, especially in goats, accurate assessment of the economic impact of the disease so far has not been possible from India. Information on concurrent application of serological and molecular tools for toxoplasma detection in goats is lacking from India. In the present communication, we report seroprevalence of toxoplasma in goats (n=80) with history of abortion from semi-arid regions of India using a recombinant surface antigen (rSAG1) based ELISA. As many as 28.75% (n-23) of the samples were seropositive for T. gondii specific antibodies and three seropositive does aborted subsequently. A nested PCR targeting P 30 genes amplified a 914 bp fragment in primary PCR and 522 bp nested product, while positive amplification at 196 bp product in the primary PCR and 96 bp nested PCR product amplified with B1 gene specific primers from one DNA sample extracted from the aborted placental cotyledons confirmed T. gondii infection in the herd. Further studies applying more samples are required to assess the magnitude of prevalence in susceptible goat population in the region.