Host specificity of flea parasites of mammals from the Andean Biogeographic Region

SANCHEZ, JULIANA P.; LOPEZ BERRIZBEITIA, M. F.; EZQUIAGA MARÌA C.

MEDICAL AND VETERINARY ENTOMOLOGY

WILEY-BLACKWELL PUBLISHING, INC

Año: 2023

0269-283X

Host specificity of fleas affects their biodiversitythat plays a major role in determining the potential transmission routes bypathogens through vertebrate hosts, including humans. In the BiogeographicAndean region, numerous systematic and ecological studies have been conducted,revealing a high diversity of flea taxa of mammals and the presence ofpathogenic organisms transmitted by fleas; however, the degree of preferencewith which each flea species associates with a mammal host remains poorlyunderstood in this region. Herein, host specificity in mammal fleas from theAndean region was analysed. We employed the number of host species for eachflea species and the index of host specificity STD*. Followingthe literature, 144 species and 13 subspecies of fleas (31 genera and 10 families)have been described in the Andean biogeographic region; 76 taxa are endemic tothis region. To carry out the analyses of host specificity, we considered 1,759records of fleas collected from 124 species and 59 genera of wild and domesticmammals, mostly rodent species (85.9%). Our results indicate that typicalAndean fleas are genus or family host specific (mostly STD*less than 3.0). More diverse mammal hosts are parasitized by more diverse fleagenera and families and these hosts are phylogenetically related. Otherwise,these hosts are associated with different flea lineages, suggesting theinteraction of ecological and evolutionary mechanisms (host-switching,ecological adaptations and co-evolutionary alternation). The fields of disease ecology and One Healthare considering the host specificity of arthropod vectors as an important pointto understand the mechanisms of emergence and re-emergence of diseases. Ourresults allow us to estimate the risk of diseases involving fleas in theAndean region.