ORIGINAL ARTICLE Hantavirus Infection among Wild Small Mammals in Vellore, South India S. Chandy 1 , R. G. Ulrich 2 , M. Schlegel 2 , R. Petraityte 3 , K. Sasnauskas 3 , D. J. Prakash 4 , V. Balraj 5 , P. Abraham 1 and G. Sridharan 1 1 Department of Clinical Virology, Christian Medical College, Vellore, Tamil Nadu, India 2 Friedrich-Loeffler-Institut, Institute for Novel and Emerging Infectious Diseases, Greifswald-Insel Riems Germany 3 Institute of Biotechnology, Vilnius University, Vilnius, Lithuania 4 Voorhees College, Vellore, Tamil Nadu, India 5 Department of Community Health, Christian Medical College, Vellore, Tamil Nadu, India Impacts • Worldwide, there is substantial risk of wildlife-related emerging zoonotic diseases. Hantaviruses are carried by numerous rodent species many of which are indigenous to India and live in close habitation with humans. • Agriculture being the mainstay of Indian economy, cultivators and farm labourers are at a risk of acquiring rodent-borne infections. As they often belong to the lower economic strata of society, their living conditions, open animal food storage and lack of garbage disposal facilities favour a close proximity between rodents and man. • Not much is known about hantavirus-related infections in India. Limited data are available on the reservoir hosts. • The isolation of Thottapalayam virus (TPMV) of genus Hantavirus from a shrew in India predates that of the prototype, Hantaan virus (HTNV). Owing to biodiversity of small wild mammals in India, rodent-borne hantaviruses, in addition to the shrew-borne TPMV, may emerge. Reservoir studies are important in understanding, controlling and preventing human hantavirus infections. Introduction Hantaviruses (family Bunyaviridae, genus Hantavirus) are rodent- and insectivore-borne viruses that can cause haemorrhagic fever with renal syndrome (HFRS) in Eur- ope and Asia and hantavirus cardiopulmonary syndrome (HCPS) in the Americas. Clinical severity depends on the infecting species with case fatality rates ranging from 0.1 Keywords: Hantavirus; black rat; bandicoot rat; house mouse; shrew; India Correspondence: G. Sridharan. Department of Clinical Virology, Christian Medical College, Dr. Ida Scudder Road, Vellore-632 004, India. Tel.: +91 416 2282070; Fax: +91 416 2223103; E-mail: g_sridharan@yahoo.com Received for publication July 12, 2010 doi: 10.1111/j.1863-2378.2012.01532.x Summary Wild indigenous small mammals including 83 rodents (bandicoot and black rats, and house mice) and a shrew captured from multiple sites in Vellore, south India, were tested for serological and molecular evidence of hantavirus infection. Indirect immunofluorescence assay (IFA) using Hantaan virus (HTNV) antigen indicated hantavirus-reactive antibodies in 16 (19.3%) of 83 rodents (bandicoot and black rats). Western blot (WB) using Thailand virus (THAIV) antigen confirmed hantavirus-reactive antibodies in nine of the 16 HTNV IFA-positive rodents. Reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) of lung and kidney tissue of captured mammals resulted in the detection of partial S segment sequence in a bandicoot rat. This study comple- ments our earlier reports on hantavirus epidemiology in south India and docu- ments first laboratory evidence for rodent-associated hantaviruses in south India. Zoonoses and Public Health ª 2012 Blackwell Verlag GmbH • Zoonoses and Public Health 1