ISDS Annual Conference Proceedings 2019. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons 

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Online Journal of Public Health Informatics * ISSN 1947-2579 * http://ojphi.org * 11(1): e411, 2019 

ISDS 2019 Conference Abstracts 

Survey of Tick-borne-disease from Ornithodoros spp. in 
Uninhabited Islands of Korea. 

Sun-Woo Han1, Yong-Sun Jo1, Jeong Byoung Chae1, Yoon kyoung Cho1, Nam-Shik Shin1, 

Hee-Jeong Youn1, Hwa-Young Youn1, Hyang-Mi Nam2, Hyun-Joo Kim2, Hae-Eun Kang2, 

Joon-seok Chae1 

1
Seoul national university , Seoul, Korea (the Republic of), 

2
Animal and Plant Quarantine Agency, Gimcheon, Korea (the Republic of)  

Objective 

The aim of this study is to survey data of ticks distribution of Korean islands and to investigate pathogens in Argasid ticks.  

Introduction 

Ticks and tick-borne diseases have been thought global important issues, because it's affect to animal and human health and 

are the cause of significant economic losses. The genus Ornithodoros spp., which is included in Family Argasidae, is usually 

associated with wild animals including seabirds and it was difficult to investigate because seabirds’ nests are found in 

inaccessible uninhabited islands. However, Ornithodoros spp. has been known for the vector of many diseases including 

African swine fever. 

Method 

In this study, nest with soil and litter of seabirds were collected, to investigate Ornithodoros species from 9 uninhabited 

islands, Nan-do, Chilsan-do, Chilbal-do, Sogukhol-do, Googul-do, Gaerin-do, Sasu-do, Hong-do (Hallyeohaesang) and Dok-

do located western and southern part of the Korea from July, 2017 to September in 2018. The islands are known for breeding 

places of migratory and resident birds. Maximum ten nests with soil and litter of seabirds were collected from one uninhabited 

island for the conservation of the islands environment. Ticks were collected from nest with soil and litter of seabirds using  

Tullgren funnel and were assayed for tick identification by PCR using 16S rRNA gene and tick-borne pathogens including 

Rickettia spp., Borrelia spp., Bartonella spp., Ehrlichia chaffensis, Ehrlichia canis, Anaplasma phagocytophilum and 

Anaplasma bovis by nested PCR. 

Results 

Total 65 Ornithodoros species ticks from 338 seabird's (black-tailed gull, Larus crassirotris; streaked shearwater, Calonectris 

leucomelas and Swinhoe's storm petrel, Oceanodroma monorhis) nesting soil with litter in 9 uninhabited islands. In the 

sequence identification of 16S rRNA gene fragment of Ornithodoros species, O. capensis and O. sawaii were 37 and 28, 

respectively. In the analyses of tick-borne pathogens, Borrelia spp. (n=5) was detected in O. sawaii from Gaerin-do and 

Googul-do. The total detection rate of Borrelia sp. from Ornithodoros spp. was 7.69% (5/65). 

Conclusions 

In this research, we discovered that O. sawaii are habitat in west and southern part of uninhabited islands to breeding place 

of black-tailed gulls and streaked shearwater and O. capensis are habitat in uninhabited islands related to breeding place of 

streaked shearwater. This is first report of the Borrelia spp. from Ornithodoros sawaii in Korea. 

Acknowledgement 

This research was supported by a fund (no. Z-1543085-2017-18-01) from Research of Animal and Plant Quarantine Agency, 

the Republic of Korea. 

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