Tropical animal health and production2026; 58(8); 600; doi: 10.1007/s11250-026-05359-1

Pasture area increases livestock rabies risk in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil: a geospatial analysis of neurological syndrome cases (2020-2024).

Monteiro, RV
·
da Costa, RFR
·
Kimura, LMS
·
de Oliveira, GR
·
Viana, NR
·
de Sá Guimarães, A
·
Silva, MR
·
de Souza, GN

Abstract: Animal rabies poses a risk to livestock in Brazil due to transmission by hematophagous bats. The Brazilian sanitary surveillance system mandates rabies testing for any livestock exhibiting signs of neurological syndrome. This geospatial, retrospective, longitudinal, observational study analyzed rabies test results for 204 cattle and 56 horses presenting with neurological syndrome in Rio de Janeiro State, Brazil, from 2020 to 2024. We calculated correlations and linear models between rabies results and municipal land-use types, as well the population of herbivores. Most neurological syndrome cases and positive rabies results occurred in cattle. The final linear model for the number of neurological syndrome cases and positive rabies results incorporated pasture area, shrub area and cattle population. Pasture area was positively correlated with higher numbers (p = 0.011 and p = 0.005, respectively). Larger shrub area was associated with fewer neurological syndrome reports and fewer positive results (p = 0.009 and p = 0.010, respectively). Greater cattle population showed a negative association with neurological syndrome notifications and positive detections (p = 0.085 and p = 0.046, respectively).A higher proportion of positive rabies tests was associated with larger pasture areas (p = 0.019) and with lower equine populations (p = 0.115). These findings indicate that the lower animal diversity in pasture areas provides few alternative feeding options for Desmodus rotundus besides livestock, leading to more neurological syndrome cases and animal rabies infections. A larger shrub area offer feed alternatives other than cattle to the bats and a larger cattle population dilutes the frequency of bat meals across individuals, reducing both neurological syndrome notifications and positive rabies detections.

Get Full Text

Publication Date: 2026-10-14 PubMed ID: 42873394PubMed Central: PMC13669118DOI: 10.1007/s11250-026-05359-1Google Scholar: Lookup

The Equine Research Bank provides access to a large database of publicly available scientific literature. Inclusion in the Research Bank does not imply endorsement of study methods or findings by Mad Barn.

Facebook X LinkedIn Email Copy

Summary
Cite This
Publication
Affiliations
MeSH
Conflict of Interest
References
Citations

Journal Article

Summary

This research summary has been generated with artificial intelligence and may contain errors and omissions. Refer to the original study to confirm details provided. Submit correction.

Overview

This study investigated how land use, particularly pasture areas, influences the risk of rabies infection in livestock in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, by examining neurological syndrome cases from 2020 to 2024.
It found that larger pasture areas increase rabies risk in cattle, while greater shrub coverage and higher livestock diversity reduce the risk.

Study Context and Objective

Rabies transmitted by hematophagous bats (Desmodus rotundus) is a significant threat to livestock in Brazil.
The Brazilian sanitary surveillance system requires testing of any livestock presenting neurological syndrome symptoms for rabies infection.
The goal was to understand how land-use patterns and livestock demographics relate to rabies infection risk in cattle and horses in Rio de Janeiro State.

Study Design and Data

Type: Geospatial, retrospective, longitudinal, observational study.
Data: Rabies test results from 204 cattle and 56 horses showing neurological syndrome signs between 2020 and 2024.
Geographic focus: Municipalities within Rio de Janeiro State, Brazil.
Variables included rabies test outcomes, land-use categories (pasture, shrubs), and herbivore population statistics (cattle, horses).

Key Findings

The majority of neurological syndrome cases and confirmed rabies positive results involved cattle rather than horses.
Statistical modeling identified three main factors associated with neurological syndrome and rabies:

Pasture area: Positively correlated with higher numbers of neurological cases and rabies positive results (significant p-values 0.011 and 0.005).
Shrub area: Larger shrub coverage was linked to fewer neurological syndrome cases and fewer positives (p-values 0.009 and 0.010), suggesting a protective effect.
Cattle population size: Surprisingly, a larger cattle population was negatively associated with syndrome notifications and positive detections (p-values 0.085 and 0.046), indicating a potential “dilution effect.”

Higher proportion of positive rabies tests was associated with:

More extensive pasture areas (p = 0.019).
Lower populations of horses (p = 0.115, not strongly significant but suggestive).

Interpretation and Biological Explanation

Pasture areas generally have low biodiversity, limiting bats’ feeding options primarily to livestock, which increases bat-livestock contact and rabies transmission risk.
Shrub habitats likely provide alternative food sources for hematophagous bats, reducing their reliance on cattle and thus lowering rabies transmission rates.
A larger cattle population may dilute encounters between bats and individual animals, lowering the chance any one animal is bitten and infected (a “dilution effect”).
Lower diversity (few species present) intensifies bat feeding on livestock, leading to more neurological syndrome cases attributed to rabies.

Implications

From a disease management perspective, preserving or restoring shrub habitats could reduce rabies risk in livestock by diversifying bat feeding options.
Pasture management strategies that maintain or increase animal diversity might help reduce the burden of rabies in cattle.
Surveillance efforts might particularly focus on cattle in areas with large pasture coverage and low animal diversity.

Summary

This study highlights the role of landscape and livestock composition in influencing rabies transmission risk in livestock in Rio de Janeiro.
It underscores the importance of ecological factors—like habitat diversity and host population structure—in zoonotic disease dynamics involving vampire bats.

Cite This Article

APA

Monteiro RV, da Costa RFR, Kimura LMS, de Oliveira GR, Viana NR, de Sá Guimarães A, Silva MR, de Souza GN. (2026). Pasture area increases livestock rabies risk in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil: a geospatial analysis of neurological syndrome cases (2020-2024). Trop Anim Health Prod, 58(8), 600. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11250-026-05359-1

Publication

Tropical animal health and production

ISSN: 1573-7438

NlmUniqueID: 1277355

Country: United States

Language: English

Volume: 58

Issue: 8

PII: 600

Researcher Affiliations

Monteiro, Rafael Veríssimo

Veterinary Medicine Department, Universidade Federal de Juiz de Fora, Av. Eugênio do Nascimento s/nº - Dom Bosco, Juiz de Fora, MG, 36038-330, Brazil. monteiro.rafael@ufjf.br.

da Costa, Renata Falcão Rabello

Secretaria de Estado de Agricultura, Pecuária e Abastecimento do Rio de Janeiro. Defesa Agropecuária. Coordenadoria de Defesa Sanitária Animal, Alameda São Boaventura, 770, Fonseca, Niteroi, RJ, 20071-004, Brazil.

Kimura, Leda Maria Silva

Empresa de Pesquisa Agropecuária do Estado do Rio de Janeiro (PESAGRO- RIO), Alameda São Boaventura, 770 - Fonseca, Niterói, RJ, 24120-191, Brazil.

de Oliveira, Glenda Ribeiro

Veterinary Medicine Department, Universidade Federal de Juiz de Fora, Av. Eugênio do Nascimento s/nº - Dom Bosco, Juiz de Fora, MG, 36038-330, Brazil.

Viana, Natiane Rodrigues

Programa de Pós-Graduação em Medicina Veterinária (Clínica e Reprodução Animal) da Universidade Federal Fluminense, Rua Vital Brazil Filho, n. 64, Vital Brasil, Niterói, Rio de Janeiro, 24230-340, Brasil.

de Sá Guimarães, Alessandro

Empresa Brasileira de Pesquisa Agropecuária - Embrapa Gado de Leite, Av. Eugênio do Nascimento, 610 - Aeroporto, Juiz de Fora, MG, 36038-330, Brazil.

Silva, Márcio Roberto

Empresa Brasileira de Pesquisa Agropecuária - Embrapa Gado de Leite, Av. Eugênio do Nascimento, 610 - Aeroporto, Juiz de Fora, MG, 36038-330, Brazil.

de Souza, Guilherme Nunes

Veterinary Medicine Department, Universidade Federal de Juiz de Fora, Av. Eugênio do Nascimento s/nº - Dom Bosco, Juiz de Fora, MG, 36038-330, Brazil.
Empresa Brasileira de Pesquisa Agropecuária - Embrapa Gado de Leite, Av. Eugênio do Nascimento, 610 - Aeroporto, Juiz de Fora, MG, 36038-330, Brazil.

MeSH Terms

Animals
Brazil / epidemiology
Cattle
Rabies / veterinary
Rabies / epidemiology
Rabies / virology
Horses
Cattle Diseases / epidemiology
Cattle Diseases / virology
Retrospective Studies
Horse Diseases / epidemiology
Horse Diseases / virology
Nervous System Diseases / epidemiology
Nervous System Diseases / veterinary
Nervous System Diseases / virology
Longitudinal Studies
Risk Factors
Livestock
Chiroptera

Conflict of Interest Statement

Declarations. Competing interest: The authors have no relevant financial or non-financial interests to disclose.

References

This article includes 25 references

Bates D, Mächler M, Bolker B, Walker S. Fitting Linear Mixed-Effects Models Using lme4. J Stat Softw 67:1–48.
doi: 10.18637/jss.v067.i01google scholar: lookup
Brasil Ministério da Agricultura, Pecuária e Abastecimento. Controle da raiva dos herbívoros: manual técnico. 2a.
Brasil IBDGEE, IBGE. Censo Agropecuário. Sistema IBGE de Recuperação Automática (SIDRA) .
Brown N, Escobar LE. A review of the diet of the common vampire bat () in the context of anthropogenic change. Mammalian Biology 103:433–453.
doi: 10.1007/s42991-023-00358-3pmc: PMC10258787pubmed: 37363038google scholar: lookup
Cocchi M, Barboza CM, Garcia JG, Zamudio RM, Champi A, Novaes RLM, Costa-Neto SF, Moratelli R, Batista HBCR. Investigation of Rabies virus in wild mammals of the atlantic forest in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Brazilian J Microbiol 55:2901–2906.
doi: 10.1007/s42770-024-014pmc: PMC11405735pubmed: 38980651google scholar: lookup
Cunha EMS, Nassar AFC, Lara M do, Villalobos CCSH, Sato ECM, Kobayashi G, Shoji Y, Itou Y, Sakai T T and, Ito FH. Pathogenicity of different rabies virus isolates and protection test in vaccinated mice. Rev Inst Med Trop Sao Paulo 52:231–236.
doi: 10.1590/s0036-46652010000500002pubmed: 21049225google scholar: lookup
de Souza PG, Amaral BMPM do and, Gitti CB. Raiva animal na cidade do Rio de Janeiro: emergência da doença em morcegos e novos desafios para o controle. Revista do Instituto Adolfo Lutz 73:119–124.
doi: 10.18241/0073-98552014731596google scholar: lookup
Filazzola A, Brown C, Dettlaff M, Amgaa B, Grenke J, Bao T, Heida I, Cahill J. The effects of livestock grazing on biodiversity are multi-trophic: a meta‐analysis. Ecol Lett 23:1298–1309.
doi: 10.1111/ele.13527pubmed: 32369874google scholar: lookup
Kremer K, Jonsson B-G, Dutta T, Tavares MF, Bauhus J. Single- vs mixed-species plantations: A systematic review on the effects on biodiversity. Biol Conserv 307:111182.
doi: 10.1016/j.biocon.2025.111182google scholar: lookup
Larmarange J. ggstats: Extension to ggplot2 for Plotting Stats. .
Martins JMP, Barbieri JM, Barçante JMP, Barçante TA, Pereira SM, Rocha CMBM. Ocorrência de raiva em herbívoros nas regiões do estado do Rio de Janeiro (Brasil) no período de 2007 a 2011 / Occurence of rabies in herbivores in regions of Rio de Janeiro (BRAZIL) from 2007 to 2011. Ars Vet 29:75.
doi: 10.15361/2175-0106.2013v29n4p75google scholar: lookup
Martins VB, de Oliveira FG, Dias AVAB, Moreira WC. Avaliação do Diagnóstico Laboratorial do Programa de Controle da Raiva Urbana no Rio de Janeiro, Brasil entre 2002–2011. Vigilância Sanitária em Debate 3:56–63.
doi: 10.3395/2317-269x.00245google scholar: lookup
Meneguete PS. Diagnóstico situacional da raiva animal no estado do Rio de Janeiro. Revista de Educação Continuada em Med Veterinária e Zootecnia do CRMV-SP 10:64–64.
Miranda C do, de SC C, Carvalho Garcia Miranda Filgueiras Tainara, de Sousa AM, Cibelle da Silva Peixoto M, Carvalho Garcia Miranda Filgueiras Tainã, Carvalho Miranda FJ, Luiz Althoff S, Gladson Corrêa Carvalho R, Veiga, Gonçalves N. Visceral Leishmaniasis and Land Use and Cover in the Carajás Integration Region, Eastern Amazon, Brazil. Tropical Medicine and Infectious Disease 7:255.
doi: 10.3390/tropicalmed7100255pmc: PMC9611653pubmed: 36287996google scholar: lookup
Mota CdaS, Ito FH, Silva MV, Sato G, Kobayashi Y, Itou T, Sakai T. Estudo imunológico e genético de 10 isolados do vírus da raiva de morcegos do Rio de Janeiro, Sudeste do Brasil. Brazilian J Veterinary Res Anim Sci 47:74–85.
doi: 10.11606/issn.1678-4456.bjvras.2010.26851google scholar: lookup
Moutinho FFB, de Andrade MGA, Nunes VMA, Rubião ECN, Batista HB, de Romijn CR, Cattaneo PC, Oliveira CA, de Oliveira FG, de Marcanth R, Silvestre N, Borges LGGR FVB, Bruno SF. Rabies in sp. in the urban area of Niterói, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.. Rev Soc Bras Med Trop 53:e20190402.
doi: 10.1590/0037-8682-0402-2019pmc: PMC7094043pubmed: 32187339google scholar: lookup
Perfecto I, Chaves LF, Fitch GM, Hajian-Forooshani Z, Iuliano B, Li K, Medina N, Morris J, Jiménez BO, Rivera-Salinas IS, Su C, Vandermeer J, White A, Williams-Guillén K. Looking beyond land-use and land-cover change: Zoonoses emerge in the agricultural matrix.. One Earth 6:1131–1142.
doi: 10.1016/j.oneear.2023.08.010google scholar: lookup
R Core Team. R: A Language and. Environment for Statistical Computing. .
Rocha SM, de Oliveira SV, Heinemann MB, Gonçalves VSP. Epidemiological Profile of Wild Rabies in Brazil (2002–2012).. Transbound Emerg Dis 64:624–633.
doi: 10.1111/tbed.12428pubmed: 26423323google scholar: lookup
Rulli MC, D’Odorico P, Galli N, John RS, Muylaert RL, Santini M, Hayman DTS. Land Use Change and Infectious Disease Emergence.. Rev Geophys 63.
doi: 10.1029/2022RG000785google scholar: lookup
Silva MV da, Xavier S, de Moreira M, Santos WC BCP dos, Esbérard CEL. Vírus rábico em morcego na Cidade do Rio de Janeiro, RJ: isolamento, titulação e epidemiologia.. Revista da Sociedade Brasileira de Medicina Tropical 40:479–481.
doi: 10.1590/S0037-86822007000400022pubmed: 17876476google scholar: lookup
Sokal RR, Rohlf FJ. Introduction to biostatistics 2nd ed., Dover ed. .
Souza CM, Shimbo Z, Rosa J, Parente MR, Alencar LLA, Rudorff A, Hasenack BFT, Matsumoto H, Ferreira MG, Souza-Filho L, de Oliveira PWM, Rocha SW, Fonseca WF, Marques AV, Diniz CB, Costa CG, Monteiro D, Rosa D, Vélez-Martin ER, Weber E, Lenti EJ, Paternost FEB, Pareyn FF, Siqueira FGC, Viera JV, Neto JL, Saraiva LCF, Sales MM, Salgado MH, Vasconcelos MPG, Galano R, Mesquita S VV, Azevedo T. Reconstructing Three Decades of Land Use and Land Cover Changes in Brazilian Biomes with Landsat Archive and Earth Engine.. Remote Sens 12:2735.
doi: 10.3390/rs12172735google scholar: lookup
Vieira LFP, Pereira SRFG, Brandão PE, Oliveira RN, Carnieli-Junior P, Galante AC, Chicarino CN, Kotait I. Caracterização molecular do vírus da raiva isolado de capturados no Estado do Rio de Janeiro.. Arquivo Brasileiro de Med Veterinária e Zootecnia 62:343–349.
doi: 10.1590/S0102-09352010000200014google scholar: lookup
White RJ, Razgour O. Emerging zoonotic diseases originating in mammals: a systematic review of effects of anthropogenic land-use change.. Mammal Rev 50:336–352.
doi: 10.1111/mam.12201pmc: PMC7300897pubmed: 32836691google scholar: lookup