Leprosy Mailing List – February 20, 2015
Ref.: (LML) NYTimes Feb. 16. 2015: Research Finds a Reason Leprosy Has Persisted
From: Judith Justice, California, USA, and Pieter Schreuder and Ben Naafs, the Netherlands
Dear LML readers,
We receive the following article from Judith Justice, Berkeley, California. After this article the editors LML would like to give their comments.
“The following article ("Research Finds a Reason Leprosy has Persisted") appears in the New York TImes on February 17, 2015. This short article is based on a study published in December 2014 in PLOS Neglect Tropical Diseases.
With best wishes,
Judith Justice
Subject: NYTimes Feb. 16. 2015: Research Finds a Reason Leprosy Has Persisted
The bacteria that cause leprosy can survive for months inside amoebae that are common in water and soil, and even in human eyes and noses, scientists at Colorado State University have found.
The discovery may help answer a question that has puzzled tropical disease experts for years: Why does the number of new leprosy cases around the world not decrease even though thousands of victims are now on drugs that make them less infectious and eventually will cure them?
There are about 200,000 new infections each year in Brazil, India, Angola, Madagascar, Myanmar, Indonesia, the Philippines and a few other countries.
The study was published in December in PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases.
Leprosy is caused by Mycobacterium leprae, slow-growing bacteria related to tuberculosis that target nerve cells beneath the skin. They cannot be cultured in the laboratory, and exactly how they infect is unclear.
Because leprosy spreads in families and among people in prolonged contact, researchers have long assumed that it always moves between human hosts.
“But we do get novel cases that don’t seem to be related to others," said William H. Wheat, a microbiologist at Colorado State University and one of the study’s authors.
M. leprae are engulfed by five kinds of common amoebae, including some that can live in mucus and eye fluids and can resist being digested. When the amoebae form cysts to avoid drying out, the study found, the bacteria can survive inside them for months and then still infect laboratory mice.
That, Dr. Wheat said, may explain how the bacteria persist and turn up even where no infected humans are found.
A version of this article appears in print on February 17, 2015, on page D6 of the New York edition with the headline: Research Finds a Reason Leprosy Has Persisted.”
Comments editors LML, February 20, 2015
According to us, the New York Times goes too far, or better the scientist goes too far to sell their research as a solution. Too many of us are tempted to do the same or have already done.
We think and it needs to be discussed: amoebae’s are at present a band-wagon. One after another of the mycobacteria species are found to have a relation with amoebae.
Amoebae host mycobacteria in trophozoites and cysts. Experimental observations indicate that the majority of environmental, opportunistic mycobacteria but also obligate pathogens including Mycobacterium tuberculosis, Mycobacterium leprae and Mycobacterium ulcerans can be inter-amoebal organisms. Amoebae clearly protect opportunistic mycobacterial pathogens during their environmental life but their role for obligate mycobacterial infection remains to be established. (Drancourt M. Looking in amoebae as a source of mycobacteria. Microb. Pathog. 77:119-24. Epub 2014 Jul 10)
Water seemed to be the source for emerging, community-acquired and health care-associated infections with Mycobacterium avium, Mycobacterium abscesses and Mycobacterium fortuitum groups, among others.
Amoebae are organisms where mycobacteria can be found and, accordingly, amoeba co-culture can be used for the isolation of mycobacteria from environmental and clinical specimens. (Drancourt M.) M. leprae has been found to survive in many environments for shorter or longer time.
We like to know your comments on this issue.
Best regards,
Editors LML
LML - S Deepak, B Naafs, S Noto and P Schreuder
LML blog link: http://leprosymailinglist.blogspot.it/
Contact: Dr Pieter Schreuder << editorlml@gmail.com
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