%0 Journal Article
%T Multilocus Genotyping of Human Giardia Isolates Suggests Limited Zoonotic Transmission and Association between Assemblage B and Flatulence in Children
%A Marianne Lebbad
%A Ingvor Petersson
%A Lillemor Karlsson
%A Silvia Botero-Kleiven
%A Jan O. Andersson
%A Bo Svenungsson
%A Staffan G. Sv£¿rd
%J PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases
%D 2011
%I Public Library of Science (PLoS)
%R 10.1371/journal.pntd.0001262
%X Background Giardia intestinalis is one of the most common diarrhea-related parasites in humans, where infection ranges from asymptomatic to acute or chronic disease. G. intestinalis consists of eight genetically distinct genotypes or assemblages, designated A¨CH, and assemblages A and B can infect humans. Giardiasis has been classified as a possible zoonotic disease but the role of animals in human disease transmission still needs to be proven. We tried to link different assemblages and sub-assemblages of G. intestinalis isolates from Swedish human patients to clinical symptoms and zoonotic transmission. Methodology/Principal Findings Multilocus sequence-based genotyping of 207 human Giardia isolates using three gene loci: £¿-giardin, glutamate dehydrogenase (gdh), and triose phosphate isomerase (tpi) was combined with assemblage-specific tpi PCRs. This analysis identified 73 patients infected with assemblage A, 128 with assemblage B, and six with mixed assemblages A+B. Multilocus genotypes (MLGs) were easily determined for the assemblage A isolates, and most patients with this genotype had apparently been infected through anthroponotic transmission. However, we also found evidence of limited zoonotic transmission of Giardia in Sweden, since a few domestic human infections involved the same assemblage A MLGs previously reported in Swedish cats and ruminants. Assemblage B was detected more frequently than assemblage A and it was also more common in patients with suspected treatment failure. However, a large genetic variability made determination of assemblage B MLGs problematic. Correlation between symptoms and assemblages was found only for flatulence, which was significantly more common in children less than six years of age infected with assemblage B. Conclusions/Significance This study shows that certain assemblage A subtypes are potentially zoonotic and that flatulence is connected to assemblage B infections in young children. Determination of MLGs from assemblages A and B can be a valuable tool in outbreak situations and to help identify possible zoonotic transmission.
%U http://www.plosntds.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pntd.0001262