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Indian Journal of Medical Microbiology, Vol. 25, No. 4, October-December, 2007, pp. 431-432 Correspondence Prevalence of Toxoplasma gondii infection amongst pregnant women in Assam, India Borkakoty BJ, Borthakur AK, Gohain M Regional Medical Research Centre, Northeast Region (Indian Council of Medical Research), Dibrugarh - 786 001, Assam Correspondence Address: Regional Medical Research Centre (BJB), Northeast Region (Indian Council of Medical Research); Department of Microbiology (AKB), Assam Medical College and Hospital; and Brahmaputra Diagnostic and Hospital Ltd. (MG), Dibrugarh - 786 001, Assam, India. Email: biswaborkakoty@rediffmail.com. Date of Submission: 18-Apr-2007 Code Number: mb07124 Dear Editor, Toxoplasma gondii infection during pregnancy is a causative factor for foetal loss and congenital infection of the newborn. [1] Reports of prevalence of this parasitic infection among pregnant women from northeast India are scanty. Therefore, a seroprevalence study covering 180 pregnant women attending Department of Obstetrics and Gynaecology, Assam Medical College and Hospital (AMCH), Dibrugarh, was conducted during 2003-2004. After written informed consent and approval from the Institutions ethical committee, 180 antenatal cases (17-40 years with a median age of 24.5 years) were enrolled with or without history of pregnancy wastage and screened for IgG and IgM antibody against T. gondii using EIA kits (Pathozyme Toxo IgG and IgM kits). The seroprevalence of T. gondii infection was 44.6 and 36.8% among the pregnant women with (n=112) and without (n=68) history of pregnancy wastage, respectively, which was statistically insignificant ( P = 0.37, 95% CI: 0.7-2.5). In addition, the IgM seroprevalence was also statistically insignificant ( P = 0.65, 95% CI: 0.47-5.2) with (8.9%) and without (5.9%) pregnancy wastage group, respectively. It was observed that higher prevalence of T. gondii infection was associated with increase in age ( P = 0.012) shown in [Figure - 1], subjects residing in rural areas ( P = 0.047, 95% CI: 1.01-3.4) and low socioeconomic status ( P = 0.014, 95% CI: 1.2-4.0). Increasing numbers of pregnancy wastage also did not had any significant association ( P = 0.28) with T. gondii infection. No significant difference in prevalence was observed among vegetarians and non-vegetarians as also with contact with cats. The prevalence of this infection from India shows a wide variation and one study has reported as high as 77% in women of reproductive age group. [2] Our study reported similar prevalence rate with one recent study from New Delhi, which found an overall anti-toxoplasma IgG seroprevalence of 45% among pregnant women. [3] Despite the favourable climatic condition of the Northeast, the study did not detect the highest prevalence rate. However, other important factors like consumption of raw or undercooked meat which are regarded as important risk factors, [4] is not rampant in the study region; otherwise there was a probability that we might have observed an even higher prevalence of T. gondii infection in this region. Although, Toxoplasma infection does not cause repeated foetal losses, this is the most common indication for investigation of toxoplasmosis in India. [5] In our study, we also did not find significantly higher prevalence of T. gondii infection with increase in pregnancy losses. In conclusion, we detected a moderately high prevalence of T. gondii infection among pregnant women from Dibrugarh region of Assam, which needs to be reckoned by the practicing physicians from this region when investigating foetal losses or congenital infection typical of toxoplasmosis. References
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