{"id":213302,"date":"2025-05-05T21:05:22","date_gmt":"2025-05-06T02:05:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2025\/05\/urban-rats-spread-deadly-bacteria-as-they-migrate-study-finds"},"modified":"2025-05-05T21:05:22","modified_gmt":"2025-05-06T02:05:22","slug":"urban-rats-spread-deadly-bacteria-as-they-migrate-study-finds","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2025\/05\/urban-rats-spread-deadly-bacteria-as-they-migrate-study-finds","title":{"rendered":"Urban rats spread deadly bacteria as they migrate, study finds"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a class=\"aligncenter blog-photo\" href=\"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog.images\/urban-rats-spread-deadly-bacteria-as-they-migrate-study-finds3.jpg\"><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Urban rats spread a deadly bacteria as they migrate within cities that can be the source of a potentially life-threatening disease in humans, according to a six-year study by Tufts University researchers and their collaborators that also discovered a novel technique for testing rat kidneys.<\/p>\n<p>Leptospirosis is a disease caused by a type of bacteria often found in rats. It\u2019s spread through their urine into soil, water, or elsewhere in the environment, where it becomes a source of infection and contamination for humans, dogs, and other species. While it\u2019s prevalent worldwide, it\u2019s more common in tropical regions, though a changing climate means it could become more common in colder regions as they warm.<\/p>\n<p>In Boston, leptospirosis persists in local rat populations, and different strains of the bacteria move around the city as groups of rats migrate, according to a new study by Marieke Rosenbaum, M.P.H., D.V.M., assistant professor in the Department of Infectious Disease and Global Health at Cummings School of Veterinary Medicine at Tufts University, along with co-authors at Northern Arizona University (NAU), the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). In addition, their <a href=\"https:\/\/medicalxpress.com\/tags\/genetic+analysis\/\" rel=\"tag\" class=\"\">genetic analysis<\/a> of a 2018 human leptospirosis case in Boston strongly suggests a link to rats as the source.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Urban rats spread a deadly bacteria as they migrate within cities that can be the source of a potentially life-threatening disease in humans, according to a six-year study by Tufts University researchers and their collaborators that also discovered a novel technique for testing rat kidneys. Leptospirosis is a disease caused by a type of bacteria [\u2026]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":732,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11,412,1495],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-213302","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-biotech-medical","category-genetics","category-health"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/213302","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/732"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=213302"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/213302\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=213302"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=213302"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=213302"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}