A Q fever outbreak with a high rate of abortions at a dairy goat farm: Coxiella burnetii shedding, environmental contamination, and viability

Abstract

This study describes a Q fever outbreak in a herd of 77 Alpine goats which suffered a high rate of abortions (81% [58/72]) in January 2017 and presents the results of monitoring the contamination and viability of Coxiella burnetii in the farm environment several months after the outbreak. Over the course of 7 months, we studied bacterial shedding by 35 dams with abortions to monitor C. burnetii infection dynamics and the duration of excretion. The highest bacterial shedding load was observed in vaginal mucus, followed by in feces and in milk. Conversely, the duration of C. burnetii shedding was longer through feces (5 months after abortion) than milk (3 months). C. burnetii DNA was detected throughout the study in aerosol samples periodically collected indoors and outdoors from the animal premises. Mouse inoculation and culture in Vero cells demonstrated the presence of viable isolates in dust collected from different surfaces inside the animal facilities during the period of time with the highest number of abortions but not in dust collected 2, 3, and 4 months after the last parturition. Some workers and visitors were affected by Q fever, with attack rates of 78% (7/9) and 31% (4/13), respectively. Affected people mostly showed fever and seroconversion, along with myalgia and arthralgia in two patients and pneumonia in the index case. The genotype identified in animal and environmental samples (SNP1/MST13) turned out to be very aggressive in goats but caused only moderate symptoms in people. After the diagnosis of abortion by Q fever in goats, several control measures were implemented at the farm to prevent contamination inside and outside the animal facilities.