Parasitological and pathological findings in capuchin monkeys infected with Schistosoma japonicum or Schistosoma mansoni

Abstract

Capuchin monkeys were studied for 7 months after exposure to Schistosoma mansoni or to either a Japanese or a Philippine strain of Schistosoma japonicum. The number of eggs present in the tissues and passed in the feces of S. mansoni-infected monkeys correlated well with the number of worm pairs recovered. Monkeys infected with the Philippine strain of S. japonicum passed large numbers of eggs in the feces and the number of these eggs correlated well with the number of worm pairs present. In monkeys infected with the Japanese strain of S. japonicum, fewer eggs were passed in the feces and there was little correlation with the number of worm pairs. Schistosome eggs were found predominantly in the small intestine in monkeys infected with the Philippine strain and predominantly in the colon in monkeys infected with the Japanese strain. The patterns of egg excretion in the feces and egg distribution in the tissues contrast with the patterns we recently described in rabbits, in which animals infected with the Philippine strain passed few eggs in the feces and showed a high proportion of tissue eggs in the colon. A single host species is thus shown to be inadequate to characterize the behavior of a schistosome strain.