Salmonella infections in reptiles--prevalence, serovar spectrum and impact on animal health.

In a seven year study, 235 lizards, 193 snakes and 111 chelonians were tested for the occurrence of Salmonella enterica. The material for analysis consisted of 251 faecal samples from reptiles suffering from diarrhoea and 288 carcasses of perished or euthanized reptiles. The carcasses were dissected and examined pathohistologically. A total of 35.3% of the lizards, 47.2% of the snakes and 11.7% of the chelonians were found to be Salmonella-positive. Systemic Salmonella infection was detected in 56.1% of the Salmonella-positive lizards and snakes carcasses; 67.4% of these were found to have pathohistological changes of varying severity in the affected organs. The relationship between the systemic Salmonella infection and pathohistological changes was highly significant. Furthermore, systemic Salmonella infections were accompanied by debilitating factors such as parasitic disease, husbandry-associated metabolic or degenerative diseases or viral infection in 63% of the cases. A total of 83 different serovars could be detected, of which 49 occurred in lizards, 36 in snakes and ten in chelonians. Infections with two Salmonella serovars were found in seven cases and in one case with three Salmonella serovars. One infection was associated with a previously undocumented Salmonella serovar in the faecal sample of a water dragon (Subsp. lllb,18:l,v,z13:z).