C. Canali et al., STUDY ON THE ELIMINATION OF ANGIOSTRONGYLUS-COSTARICENSIS FIRST STAGELARVAE IN THE EXPERIMENTAL-INFECTION OF SWISS MICE, Memorias do Instituto Oswaldo Cruz, 93(2), 1998, pp. 269-272
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.