Theileria, Babesia, and Anaplasma spp. in ticks
We detected A. marginale, the cause of gall sickness, B. bigemina, which causes redwater, and T. parva , which causes East Coast fever in 1.88%, 0.63%, and 0.31% (estimated true prevalences) of rhipicephaline ticks, respectively. These three diseases are major impediments to livestock production in Kenya and SSA, causing severe loss of production in affected animals (Wesonga et al., 2010; Woolhouse et al., 2015). We recently found T. parva more frequently in Rh. appendiculatus (15.7% of tick pools) sampled in the Maasai Mara National Reserve, where no Babesia was detected (Oundo et al., 2020). The absence of T. parva in animal blood samples in this study may be partly explained by its biology, where most of its life cycle is found in the lymphoid system and only multiplies in RBC for completion of its life cycle (Mans et al., 2015). Accordingly, we found higher prevalence in ticks of the mildly pathogenic Theileria spp., T. taurotragi, T. velifera, and T. mutans than reported by Njiiri et al. (2015) in calves in Busia, Kenya, and by Lorusso et al. (2016) in Nigerian cattle. Nonetheless, these species can also cause theileriosis in immuno-compromised animals. We also detected Anaplasma platys, the cause of canine cyclic thrombocytopenia, in several pools ofRhipicephalus ticks from cattle. This pathogenic bacterium has been reported in other studies in ticks and blood from livestock (Omondi et al., 2017; Said et al., 2017; Lorusso et al., 2016) and recent evidence suggests that A. platys may infect humans, posing a risk in cases of opportunistic tick bites (Arraga-Alvarado et al., 2014; Breitschwerdt et al., 2014; Maggi et al., 2013).