Serological evidence of possible Borrelia afzelii lyme disease in Greece

I Karageorgou; M Koutantou; I Papadogiannaki; A Voulgari-Kokota; S Makka; E Angelakis

doi:10.1016/j.nmni.2022.100978

Serological evidence of possible Borrelia afzelii lyme disease in Greece

New Microbes New Infect. 2022 Mar 31:46:100978. doi: 10.1016/j.nmni.2022.100978. eCollection 2022 Mar.

Authors

I Karageorgou¹, M Koutantou¹, I Papadogiannaki¹, A Voulgari-Kokota¹, S Makka¹, E Angelakis¹

Affiliation

¹ Diagnostic Department and Public Health Laboratories, Hellenic Pasteur Institute, Athens, Greece.

Abstract

Suggestions that Lyme disease exists in Greece remain controversial and no study to date has definitively identified the presence of a Borrelia species that infects humans. We examined patients throughout Greece suspected for Lyme disease by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) and by western blotting for Borrelia burgdorferi sensu lato species. We found one patient positive for Borrelia burgdorferi and two patients positive for Borrelia afzelii specific IgG antibodies. Both B. afzelii patients were suffering by neurological manifestations and had never traveled abroad. We provide serological evidence of two autochthonous Lyme disease cases in Greece, possibly caused by B. afzelii.

Keywords: Borrelia afzelii; Greece; Lyme borrelia; lyme disease.