Kapitančik, B., *Řeháček, J.,*Kocianová, E., *Kováčová, E., Naď, O., Jurčina, A.
University of Veterinary Medicine
Komenskeho 73
041 81 Kosice
Slovak Republic
*
Institute of Virology
Dúbravská cesta 9
842 46 Bratislava
The Slovak Republic
Summary
Coxiella burnetii was introduced into the uninfected terrain of Slovakia presumably by infected sheep from Romania and became wide-spread among sheep flocks and cattle herds. This set off a chain of Q fever outbreaks mainly between 1960 and 1975 among agricultural workers exposed to infection because of their occupational activities. The source of most of these epidemics was in those cattle of eastern Slovakia (ESR) introduced without stringent veterinary supervision, into the previously unaffected areas from the infected regions of western and central Slovakia. C. burnetii is now well established in the primary foci of infection in ESR, where it is sustained by small mammals and their tick ectoparasites. Domestic animals create secondary foci of infection where C. burnetii can stay alive in the animals without the involvement of arthropods; these secondary foci are the main sources of human infections and no arthropod transmission would seem to be involved.
Although C. burnetii is now well established in the ESR there have not been any Q fever epidemics in recent years. What we really need to know is how the infection switches from a relatively innocuous primary focus into a dangerous secondary focus, as the latter are invariably responsible for all the Q fever cases and epidemics in Slovakia.
