Hantavirus Pulmonary Syndrome in Northwestern Argentina: seroprevalence in rodents of Jujuy province and first seropositive record for Euryoryzomys legatus

Hantavirus Pulmonary Syndrome (HPS) is a Pan-American emerging infectious disease with a high mortality rate caused by rodent-borne viruses of the genus Orthohantavirus. In Argentina, almost half of the HPS infections occur in the northwestern endemic region. In this study, we evaluated rodent composition, abundance, and antibody prevalence in wild rodents in three subtropical sites: primary forest, secondary forest, and crop fields. From February 2022 to June 2023, we settled a total of 200 traps for three nights every two months reaching a capture-effort of 5,400 trap-nights. We took blood samples from all captured rodents, registered morphological measures, then marked and released. We captured 103 rodents of 5 species (Oligoryzomys chacoensis, Calomys fecundus, Calomys musculinus, Akodon simulator, and Euryoryzomys legatus). The overall antibody prevalence was 10.18%; with C. fecundus and A. simulator being the species most frequently found to present antibodies, and they were also the dominant species in the captured rodent community. The secondary forest was, by far, the most productive site with 83.5% of all captures, followed by crop fields (10.68%) and primary forest (5.82%). We found that antibody prevalence for C. fecundus was positively correlated to body mass (weight) and size (total length). Another important result of our work is that we report presence of hantavirus antibodies in E. legatus, which represents the first record for this species. These results highlight the importance of continuous monitoring of rodents populations and provide a framework for the planning and implementation of public health prevention campaigns of field workers.