Human Infections with Borrelia miyamotoi, Japan

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Kozue Sato, Ai Takano, Satoru Konnai, Minoru Nakao, Takuya Ito, Kojiro Koyama, Minoru Kaneko, Makoto Ohnishi, and Hiroki Kawabata

Author affiliations: National Institute of Infectious Diseases, Tokyo, Japan (K. Sato, M. Ohnishi, H. Kawabata);Yamaguchi University, Yamaguchi, Japan (A. Takano); Hokkaido University, Sapporo, Japan (S. Konnai);Asahikawa Medical College, Asahikawa, Japan (M. Nakao); Hokkaido Institute of Public Health, Sapparo (T. Ito);Oumu National Health Insurance Hospital, Oumu, Japan (K. Koyama); Kamifurano Hospital, Kamifurano, Japan (M. Kaneko, Japan); Gifu University, Gifu, Japan (H. Kawabata)

Abstract

We confirmed infection of 2 patients with Borrelia miyamotoi in Japan by retrospective surveillance of Lyme disease patients and detection of B. miyamotoi DNA in serum samples. One patient also showed seroconversion for antibody against recombinant glycerophosphodiester phosphodiesterase of B. miyamotoi. Indigenous relapsing fever should be considered a health concern in Japan.

Borrelia miyamotoi, which is genetically grouped with relapsing fever borreliae, was recently identified as a human pathogen in Russia (1), the United States (2–4), and Europe (5). Ticks of the Ixodes persulcatus species complex are transmission vectors. Pathogenic borreliae were discovered in I. persulcatus ticks in Japan (6).

In areas of Japan to which Lyme disease is endemic, wild rodents have been found to be infected with B. miyamotoi (7), although no human infections have been confirmed. B. miyamotoi isolates from Japan are potential human pathogens because they form a monophyletic lineage with isolates from patients in Russia (1). We conducted a retrospective investigation to identify occult cases of human infections with B. miyamotoi in Japan.