Rats in the city : implications for zoonotic disease risk in an urbanizing world

Urbanization is rapidly transforming much of Southeast Asia, altering the structure and function of the landscape, as well as the frequency and intensity of the interactions between people, animals, and the environment. In this study, we began to explore the impact of urbanization on zoonotic diseas...

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Main Authors: Blassdell, Kim R., Morand, Serge, Laurance, Susan G.W., Doggett, Stephen L., Hahs, Amy, Perera, David, Cadhla, Firth
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory 2021
Subjects:
Online Access:http://ir.unimas.my/id/eprint/35394/2/Rats%20in%20the%20city%20-%20Copy.pdf
http://ir.unimas.my/id/eprint/35394/
https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.03.18.436089v1
https://doi.org/10.1101/2021.03.18.436089
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Institution: Universiti Malaysia Sarawak
Language: English
id my.unimas.ir.35394
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spelling my.unimas.ir.353942022-05-23T02:05:54Z http://ir.unimas.my/id/eprint/35394/ Rats in the city : implications for zoonotic disease risk in an urbanizing world Blassdell, Kim R. Morand, Serge Laurance, Susan G.W. Doggett, Stephen L. Hahs, Amy Perera, David Cadhla, Firth Q Science (General) QL Zoology QR Microbiology Urbanization is rapidly transforming much of Southeast Asia, altering the structure and function of the landscape, as well as the frequency and intensity of the interactions between people, animals, and the environment. In this study, we began to explore the impact of urbanization on zoonotic disease risk by simultaneously characterizing changes in the abundance and diversity of reservoir hosts (rodents), ectoparasite vectors (ticks), and microbial pathogens across a gradient of urbanization in Malaysian Borneo. We found that although rodent species diversity decreased with increasing urbanization, two species appeared to thrive in anthropogenic environments: the invasive urban exploiter, Rattus rattus and the native urban adapter, Sundamys muelleri. R. rattus was strongly associated with the presence of built infrastructure across the gradient and dominated the urban rodent community where it was associated with high microbial diversity and multi-host zoonoses capable of environmental transmission, including Leptospira spp., and Toxoplasma gondii. In contrast, S. muelleri was restricted to sites with a significant vegetative component where it was found at high densities in the urban location. This species was strongly associated with the presence of ticks, including the medically important genera Ambylomma, Haemaphysalis, and Ixodes. Overall, our results demonstrate that the response to urbanization varies by species at all levels: host, ectoparasite, and microbe. This may lead to increased zoonotic disease risk in a subset of environments across urban and urbanizing landscapes that can be reduced through improved pest management and public health messaging. Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory 2021-03-19 Article PeerReviewed text en http://ir.unimas.my/id/eprint/35394/2/Rats%20in%20the%20city%20-%20Copy.pdf Blassdell, Kim R. and Morand, Serge and Laurance, Susan G.W. and Doggett, Stephen L. and Hahs, Amy and Perera, David and Cadhla, Firth (2021) Rats in the city : implications for zoonotic disease risk in an urbanizing world. bioRxiv - The preprint server for biology, 1 (1). pp. 1-61. https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.03.18.436089v1 https://doi.org/10.1101/2021.03.18.436089
institution Universiti Malaysia Sarawak
building Centre for Academic Information Services (CAIS)
collection Institutional Repository
continent Asia
country Malaysia
content_provider Universiti Malaysia Sarawak
content_source UNIMAS Institutional Repository
url_provider http://ir.unimas.my/
language English
topic Q Science (General)
QL Zoology
QR Microbiology
spellingShingle Q Science (General)
QL Zoology
QR Microbiology
Blassdell, Kim R.
Morand, Serge
Laurance, Susan G.W.
Doggett, Stephen L.
Hahs, Amy
Perera, David
Cadhla, Firth
Rats in the city : implications for zoonotic disease risk in an urbanizing world
description Urbanization is rapidly transforming much of Southeast Asia, altering the structure and function of the landscape, as well as the frequency and intensity of the interactions between people, animals, and the environment. In this study, we began to explore the impact of urbanization on zoonotic disease risk by simultaneously characterizing changes in the abundance and diversity of reservoir hosts (rodents), ectoparasite vectors (ticks), and microbial pathogens across a gradient of urbanization in Malaysian Borneo. We found that although rodent species diversity decreased with increasing urbanization, two species appeared to thrive in anthropogenic environments: the invasive urban exploiter, Rattus rattus and the native urban adapter, Sundamys muelleri. R. rattus was strongly associated with the presence of built infrastructure across the gradient and dominated the urban rodent community where it was associated with high microbial diversity and multi-host zoonoses capable of environmental transmission, including Leptospira spp., and Toxoplasma gondii. In contrast, S. muelleri was restricted to sites with a significant vegetative component where it was found at high densities in the urban location. This species was strongly associated with the presence of ticks, including the medically important genera Ambylomma, Haemaphysalis, and Ixodes. Overall, our results demonstrate that the response to urbanization varies by species at all levels: host, ectoparasite, and microbe. This may lead to increased zoonotic disease risk in a subset of environments across urban and urbanizing landscapes that can be reduced through improved pest management and public health messaging.
format Article
author Blassdell, Kim R.
Morand, Serge
Laurance, Susan G.W.
Doggett, Stephen L.
Hahs, Amy
Perera, David
Cadhla, Firth
author_facet Blassdell, Kim R.
Morand, Serge
Laurance, Susan G.W.
Doggett, Stephen L.
Hahs, Amy
Perera, David
Cadhla, Firth
author_sort Blassdell, Kim R.
title Rats in the city : implications for zoonotic disease risk in an urbanizing world
title_short Rats in the city : implications for zoonotic disease risk in an urbanizing world
title_full Rats in the city : implications for zoonotic disease risk in an urbanizing world
title_fullStr Rats in the city : implications for zoonotic disease risk in an urbanizing world
title_full_unstemmed Rats in the city : implications for zoonotic disease risk in an urbanizing world
title_sort rats in the city : implications for zoonotic disease risk in an urbanizing world
publisher Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory
publishDate 2021
url http://ir.unimas.my/id/eprint/35394/2/Rats%20in%20the%20city%20-%20Copy.pdf
http://ir.unimas.my/id/eprint/35394/
https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.03.18.436089v1
https://doi.org/10.1101/2021.03.18.436089
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