Leishmania infantum-specific IFN-? production in stimulated blood from cats living in areas where canine leishmaniosis is endemic

Priolo, Vito; Martínez-Orellana, Pamela; Pennisi, Maria Grazia; Masucci, Marisa; Prandi, David; Ippolito, Dorotea; Bruno, Federica; Castelli, Germano; Solano-Gallego, Laia

Thirteen cats (9%) were antibody-positive to FIV and 4 (2%) were antigen-positive to FeLV (Table 2) . FIV and FeLV co-infections were never detected. All FeLVpositive cats were from Catalonia while there was no (2) difference in FIV prevalence between cats enrolled in Sicily (9%) and in Catalonia (8%) ( Table 2) . Moreover, there were no statistical differences in prevalence of anti-L. infantum antibodies or Leishmania DNA positivity in cats positive to FIV or FeLV compared to the negatives. Similarly, no statistical difference was found for the levels of anti-L. infantum antibodies or L. infantum parasite load between FIV-or FeLV-positive cats and the negative ones. Interestingly, four FIV-and two FeLV-positive cats were also positive to one or more L. infantum diagnostic tests. Only one FeLV-and two FIV-positive cats produced IFN-γ after LSA stimulation. Moreover, two of them were positive to both serological tests and blood PCR. Conversely, 107 cats were L. infantum and retrovirus negative and 21 produced IFN-γ after LSA stimulation. There were no statistical differences in IFN-γ productions (after LSA or ConA stimulations) between FIV-or FeLV-positive and negative cats.