[The role of large wildlife in the maintenance of natural foci of tick-borne meningoencephalitis in northern Croatia]

Abstract

Between 1986-1988 sera from 245 game animals--37 roe deers, 102 red deers, 81 wild boars and 25 hares--shot in 8 different localities of Nort Croatia, a well-known nosoareal of tick-borne encephalitis, were tested for TBE virus heminhibiting antibodies. The following percentages of positive animals were found: 24, 39, 39 and 0% respectively. Most of the animals examined, 180 of them, were shot in lowland woods of the commune of Nasice and its surroundings. There the percentage of positive animals was somewhat higher: 36, 41, 42 and 0 respectively. As these animals regularly participate in the feeding cycle of the ubiquitous wood tick Ixodes ricinus, the main vector of the tick-borne meningoencephalitis virus, it is infered that they (the hare being excluded in this study), apart from myomorphous mammals, play an important role in the transmission chain of the tick-borne meningoencephalitis virus in the respective natural foci of this zoonosis.