A Brief History of the NAMRU-3 Medical Zoology Program

The NAMRU-3 Medical Zoology program began during Easter week of 1950. We had just closed the NAMRU-3 field station at Torit, in Equatoria Province of soulheastern Sudan, and were heading homeward to the United States. However, the offer to remain in Egypt for a year or two to develop a Medical Zoology department at NAMRU-3 provided an interesting challenge after working for several years in tropical forests and grasslands of Africa and other continents. We shall briefly describe subsequent events under four headings: (1) Medical Zoology in Egypt, (2) Ticks and Tickborne Diseases of the World, (3) Kala Azar in the Sudan, and (4) Miscellaneous Activities

A meta-analysis of host specificity in Neotropical hard ticks (Acari: Ixodidae)

Host specificity of Neotropical hard ticks (Acari: Ixodidae) was analyzed by using the number of hosts species for each tick species and the index of host specificity STD*, which integrates phylogenetic and ecological information. The analyses were based on 4172 records of hard ticks collected from wild and domestic tetrapods. Most tick species included in this study were associated with three to 20 host species. No tick species has been associated either with a single species or with a single genus of host. It was found that the number of host species is sensitive to sampling effort, but not the STD*. The most frequent values of STD* were between 2.5 and 3.5, which shows that the host species more frequently used by Neotropical hard tick species belong to different families or different orders. Immature stages tend to use a broader taxonomic range of hosts than adults, and the interpretation of both measures of host specificity used in this study led to the conclusion that the impact of non-endemic hosts does not alter the patterns of host specificity in Neotropical hard ticks. The index STD* showed that a high proportion of tick species has phylogenetically unrelated species as principal hosts. The conclusion reached in this work indicates that strict host specificity is not common among Neotropical hard ticks and suggests that the influence of tick ecology and evolution of habitat specificity, tick generation time, phenology, time spent off the host and the type of life-cycle could be more important than hosts species.Fil: Nava, Santiago. Instituto Nacional de Tecnologia Agropecuaria. Centro Regional Santa Fe. Estacion Experimental Agropecuaria Rafaela; Argentina. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Santa Fe; ArgentinaFil: Guglielmone, Alberto Alejandro. Instituto Nacional de Tecnologia Agropecuaria. Centro Regional Santa Fe. Estacion Experimental Agropecuaria Rafaela; Argentina. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Santa Fe; Argentin

Notes on African Haemaphysalis ticks. XIII. Identity of H. (Rhipistoma) cooleyi, a parasite of the rock hyrax in South Africa (Acarina: Ixodidae)

The lectotype male, allotype female, and paratype nymph of Haemaphysalis (Rhipistoma) cooleyi Bedford, 1929, a parasite of the rock hyrax, Procavia capensis, in the Transvaal, are redescribed and illustrated to provide reliable criteria for differentiating between haemaphysaline parasites of hyraxes. Keys are included for identifying adults of these Haemaphysalis spp. (orientalis Nuttall & Warburton, 1915; bequaerti Hoogstraal, 1956; cooleyi Bedford, 1929; hyracophila Hoogstraal, Walker & Neitz, 1971).The articles have been scanned in colour with a HP Scanjet 5590; 600dpi. Adobe Acrobat XI Pro was used to OCR the text and also for the merging and conversion to the final presentation PDF-format

Notes on African Haemaphysalis ticks. XV. H. (Rhipistoma) norvali sp. n., a hedgehog parasite of the H. (R.) spinulosa group in Zimbabwe (Acarina: Ixodidae)

The male, female, nymph, and larva of Haemaphysalis (Rhipistoma) norvali sp. n., are described and compared with other members of the H. (R.) spinulosa group. Adult H. (R.) norvali parasitize the southern African hedgehog, Erinaceus frontalis Smith, in Matabeleland, Zimbabwe. Immatures were reared on a laboratory rabbit.The articles have been scanned in colour with a HP Scanjet 5590; 600dpi. Adobe Acrobat XI Pro was used to OCR the text and also for the merging and conversion to the final presentation PDF-format

Nosocomial Outbreak of Crimean-Congo Hemorrhagic Fever, Sudan

To confirm the presence of Crimean-Congo hemorrhagic fever in Sudan, we tested serum of 8 patients with hemorrhagic fever in a rural hospital in 2008. Reverse transcription–PCR identified Crimean-Congo hemorrhagic fever virus. Its identification as group III lineage indicated links to virus strains from South Africa, Mauritania, and Nigeria

Crimean-Congo Hemorrhagic Fever Virus in High-Risk Population, Turkey

In the Tokat and Sivas provinces of Turkey, the overall Crimean-Congo hemorrhagic fever virus (CCHFV) seroprevalence was 12.8% among 782 members of a high-risk population. CCHFV seroprevalence was associated with history of tick bite or tick removal from animals, employment in animal husbandry or farming, and being >40 years of age