Peer-reviewed veterinary case report
Giardia cysts found in 31% of dog poop in city parks
By Papini, R et al.·Published in Preventive veterinary medicine·2009·University of Pisa, Italy·View original on PubMed →
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Original publication title: Occurrence and cyst burden of Giardia duodenalis in dog faecal deposits from urban green areas: Implications for environmental contamination and related risks.
- Species:
- dog
Plain-English summary
A study found that about 31% of dog poop collected from urban parks contained Giardia cysts, a parasite that can cause gastrointestinal issues in pets. The number of cysts varied widely, with some samples having over 1,400 cysts per gram. This suggests that dogs can easily spread Giardia to each other in these public areas, especially where many dogs frequent. However, the risk of dogs transmitting Giardia to humans appears to be low, as only a small fraction of the samples had the strain that could affect people. Keeping your dog away from contaminated areas and cleaning up after them can help reduce the risk.
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Abstract
To investigate the prevalence and cyst burden of Giardia duodenalis as well as the genetic identity and possible zoonotic potential of isolates in canine faeces left on soil, a total of 143 freshly passed faecal specimens were collected in four different green urban areas and examined by Real-time PCR. Overall, 30.8% of faeces from different dogs that defecated in urban areas were found to harbour Giardia cysts, with single area positivity proportions ranging from 4.2% to 47.8%; significant (P<0.05) and highly significant (P<0.01) differences were found in the prevalence among different areas investigated. The number of cysts ranged from 2 to 1428 per gram of faeces. Results emphasize that a high risk of dog-to-dog Giardia transmission may occur in public areas where high quantities of faeces from infected dogs are daily left to cumulate on the ground. Results suggest there is a low risk for zoonotic transmission of Giardia: only 0.6% of canine faeces contaminating urban areas were carrying subgenotype A1, which is considered as the most potentially transmissible to humans.
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Search related cases →Original publication on PubMed: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/19671479/