Lethality of leptospirosis depends on sex: male hamsters succumb to infection with lower doses of pathogenic Leptospira

Leptospirosis is a widespread zoonotic disease caused by pathogenic spirochetes of the genus Leptospira which affect both humans and animals. A somewhat contradictory published body of evidence suggests that sex impacts severity outcomes of human Leptospirosis. In this study, we used an acute animal model of disease to analyze how male and female hamsters infected side-by-side with low but increasing doses of L. interrogans under the same exposure conditions develop Leptospirosis. We found that female hamsters were considerably more resistant to Leptospirosis given that 87.5% survived infection; male hamsters did not gain weight and 93.7% succumbed to infection with the same infectious doses. Analysis of bacterial burden in kidney of male hamsters showed that infection with the lowest dose (103) resulted in a 4Log increase of L. interrogans, whereas females infected with the same dose had a reduction of ~1Log, after 28 days of infection. Non-surviving hamsters had signs of compromised renal function (higher levels of creatinine in blood), as well as increased levels of anti-inflammatory IL-10 and innate response pro-inflammatory CCL3, CxCL10 and TNF-α in kidney, as well as ColA1 which is a marker of kidney fibrosis. In endemic areas, humans are more often exposed to the lower infection doses which were lethal to males, than the higher doses which were lethal to males and females. It is possible that the frequency of lower infectious doses in nature and increased biological susceptibility both contribute for aggravated outcomes of leptospirosis in males.