Congenital Toxoplasmosis and Reinfection during Pregnancy

J Infect Dis. 2008 Nov 25. [Epub ahead of print]

Congenital Toxoplasmosis and Reinfection during Pregnancy: Case Report, Strain Characterization, Experimental Model of Reinfection, and Review

Elbez-Rubinstein A, Ajzenberg D, Dardé ML, Cohen R, Dumètre A, Yera H, Gondon E, Janaud JC, Thulliez P.

1Service de Néonatologie and 2Laboratoire de Bactériologie, Hôpital Intercommunal de Créteil, Créteil, 3Centre National de Référence Toxoplasmose/Toxoplasma Biological Resource Center, Centre Hospitalier-Universitaire Dupuytren, and 4Laboratoire de Parasitologie-Mycologie, EA 3174-NETEC, Faculté de Médecine, Université de Limoges, Limoges, and 5Institut de Puériculture de Paris, Paris, France.

We present a case of disseminated congenital toxoplasmosis in a newborn born to a mother who had been immunized against toxoplasmosis before conception. The mother was reinfected, likely by ingestion of imported raw horse meat during pregnancy. This clinical presentation is exceptional in France and raised the possibility of infection by a highly virulent Toxoplasma strain. The strain responsible was isolated from the peripheral blood of the newborn, and when genotyped with microsatellite markers, it exhibited an atypical genotype, one which is very uncommon in Europe but had been described in South America. We tested the hypothesis of a reinfection with a different genotype by using an experimental mouse model, which confirmed that acquired immunity against European Toxoplasma strains may not protect against reinfection by atypical strains acquired during travel outside Europe or by eating imported meat.

PMID: 19032062 [PubMed - as supplied by publisher]