The Impact of Ivermectin Treatment in Cattle on Dung Degradation and Fauna Abundance and Diversity in Tanzania

Ivermectin also called the wonder drug has been used over the years to control internal and external parasites in livestock. In humans it has been used for the control of several neglected tropical diseases. With regards to efforts to control malaria, mass drug administration (MDA) of ivermectin in humans and livestock has been considered as a potential tool. This is due to challenges in malaria preventive strategies such as insecticide resistance in mosquitoes, shift in their behaviors and residual transmission. Ivermectin reduces malaria transmission by targeting the mosquito nervous system resulting in their death. Ivermectin and its metabolites could have great impacts on the environment as well as human and health. In temperate settings, impacts of ivermectin in the environment were studied due to intense use of the drug in livestock. There is also a necessity to study effects of ivermectin in the tropics before MDA for malaria vector control. Despite its great potential, previous studies done recorded toxicity and sensitivity of the drug to most arthropods mainly dung organisms because ivermectin is released in dung at high concentrations for the case of livestock. With dung organism activity being affected the dung decomposition process is disrupted, cattle avoid these grazing areas leading to financial losses. In the tropics where there is a high number of malaria cases, there is no information on the impacts of the drug in the environment. We placed standardized dung pats from ivermectin-treated and control cattle to determine the effect of ivermectin on dung degradation and dung fauna in Tanzania. For the dung degradation study, at 15, 30 and 45 days post placement, we observed a total of 220 dung pats in the field. We measured termite colonization; wet weight of the entire pat; water content; dry weight of the 10 g subsamples and organic matter from subsamples and the whole pat. For the dung fauna study, we collected fresh dung 3, 10 and 29 days post treatment and put the pats out in the field to be colonized by insects before being transferred to emergence traps. We also did a semi field study where we collected dung pats 1,2,3 and 5 days post treatment to obtain larvae counts. We qualitatively assessed insect larvae activity in the field experiment and observed and counted larvae in the semi field study. We found that termites colonized pats from cattle treated with ivermectin more readily compared to controls (p < 0.001). Compared to control pats, the treated pats' wet weight decreased more slowly on day 15 (p < 0.001), day 30 (p < 0.001), and on day 45 (p = 0.037). Percent dry weight increased over time and similarly between the treatments as water content decreased. Organic matter of the 10g sub samples was similar between the treatments. Total organic matter in the whole pats showed significant differences on day 15 (p < 0.001), and day 30 (p = 0.003), but not on day 45 (p = 0.291). Qualitatively, we observed that pats from treated cattle had less insect larvae activity as compared to controls in the field study. In the semi field study, we counted less larvae in the pats from ivermectin-treated cattle than in the control pats (p < 0.001). Our results indicate that ivermectin and its residues affect dung degradation and dung fauna in tropical savanna settings, and the environmental safety may be at risk upon mass drug administration in livestock.