Background: The Argentine Hemorrhagic Fever (AHF) is a zoonotic disease endemic in a wide area of the humid pampa of Argentina. The etiologic agent is the Junin virus that is maintained in the wild by the rodent Calomys musculinus and transmitted to humans, mainly, through aerosols generated from secretions and excretions.
Aims: To characterize and compare the assemblages of small rodent composition and diversity inside the epidemic, historic and non-endemic zone of AHF and to register C. musculinus abundance in each zone and in each area within each zone, registering the prevalence of infection in rodent populations.
Method: One central and two peripheral areas were delimited to sample rodents in each zone with different incidence of AHF. Thus, 18 localities were selected to do the sampling in two years. Host abundance between zones and among areas inside each zone and among nearby areas between zones were compared applying nested ANOVA's.
Results: In each zone, the rodent assemblage showed differences in composition, diversity and numeric representation of C. musculinus. The epidemic zone was the richest of the three, registering also great host abundance; meanwhile in the historic zone, A. azarae was the dominant numeric species with less number of other species. Regarding the non-endemic zone, the assemblage composition and C. musculinus abundance varied respect the sampled year. Junin virus infection was only detected in C. musculinus individuals corresponding to the epidemic zone, with a prevalence of 2.7 and 1.1% for the years 2007 and 2008, respectively.
Conclusion: In this system, the abundance of C. musculinus could be impacting over the pathogen dynamic, rather than the assemblage diversity or the A. azarae presence.