STUDY ON THE ELIMINATION OF ANGIOSTRONGYLUS-COSTARICENSIS FIRST STAGELARVAE IN THE EXPERIMENTAL-INFECTION OF SWISS MICE

Abdominal angiostrongylosis is a nematode infection of wild rodents. H uman infection may result in severe abdominal disease and has been rep orted from several countries in the Americas. The domestic mouse, Mus musculus, has not been found with natural infection and like other urb an rodents, should not be considered a natural host for Angiostrongylu s costaricensis. Quantification of parasitic forms released for transm ission may better express the coevolutionary status in parasite-host r elationship. With this objective, five groups of experimentally infect ed Swiss mice were followed for up to 155 days post-infection (PI) day s and the quantification of first stage larvae (L1) output revealed: a n irregular elimination of L1 and a huge variation in the patency peri od (1 to 114 days) and in the number of L1 eliminated daily by individ ual animals (1 to 6340 L1/g). Overall mortality was 72% (range: 28% to 100%) at seven weeks PI. In conclusion abdominal angiostrongylosis in M. musculus presents high mortality and a very variable and irregular elimination of L1 in feces.