Study of Trichinella patagoniensis in wild boars

Abstract

Trichinellosis is a zoonotic disease, which represents a significant public health concern in some South American countries, such as Argentina and Chile. Its impact is essentially due to absence of adequate control measures on meat from game animals, as well as the presence of illegal slaughterhouses and the trade of meat products without being tested for this parasite. In Argentina, trichinellosis is an endemic disease. At present, Trichinella spiralis, Trichinella patagoniensis, Trichinella pseudospiralis, and Trichinella britovi have been detected in animals from Argentina. Until now, T. patagoniensis had only been found in mountain cougars (Puma concolor) in Argentina but there is limited information available. The present study intends to determine susceptibility, serological response and distribution of muscle larvae in wild boars infected with T. patagoniensis, T. spiralis and T. pseudospiralis. For each of the Trichinella species five wild boars were inoculated with 20,000 muscle larvae. Except for two specimens which died during the experiment, the animals were euthanized 19 weeks post infection (pi). Blood samples were collected throughout the study in order to determine the antibody kinetics. Also, nine muscle samples from each specimen were taken and analysed for determination of larval distribution. Additionally, four muscle samples were used to obtain muscle juices. Wild boars infected with T. patagoniensis showed little to no larvae in the muscle samples analysed while animals infected with T. spiralis and T. pseudospiralis had a significantly high larval load in all the samples analysed. Optical density (OD) values remained above the cut-off value throughout the experiment. This is the first study to characterize the biological aspects of T. patagoniensis in wild boars.