info:eu-repo/semantics/article
Hantavirus infection and biodiversity in the Americas
Fecha
2019-12Registro en:
Vadell, María Victoria; Gomez Villafañe, Isabel Elisa; Carbajo, Anibal Eduardo; Hantavirus infection and biodiversity in the Americas; Springer; Oecologia; 192; 12-2019; 169-177
0029-8549
CONICET Digital
CONICET
Autor
Vadell, María Victoria
Gomez Villafañe, Isabel Elisa
Carbajo, Anibal Eduardo
Resumen
Species diversity has been proposed to decrease prevalence of disease in a wide variety of host'pathogen systems, in a phenomenon labeled the dilution effect. This phenomenon was first proposed and tested for vector-borne diseases but was later extended to directly transmitted parasite systems such as hantavirus. Though there seems to be clear evidence for the dilution effect in some hantavirus/rodent systems, the generality of this hypothesis remains debated. In the present meta-analysis, we examined the evidence supporting the dilution effect for hantavirus/rodent systems in the Americas. General linear models employed on data from 56 field studies identified the abundance of the reservoir rodent species and its relative proportion in the community as the only relevant variables explaining the prevalence of antibodies against hantavirus in the reservoir. Thus, we found no clear support for the dilution effect hypothesis for hantavirus/rodent systems in the Americas.