01-17-2009, 05:32 PM
As Damon#699;s post to the Starbulletin pointed out, things have gone from bad to worse for our friend whose brain tissue has worm tracks from A. cantonensis eaten into it.
Thanks for the musings and things to think about Alaskasteven...As to the experiment with the rat and the slime, I am not sure this would prove anything except that the rat may or may not get the illness from the slime. Also the rat is the natural host and the human is not so the nematode will behave differently and eventually dies in the human. The question they may have is the number of third stage nematodes that a human must ingest in order to contract the illness. I would think that something more similar to a human would have to be tested in order to get some idea because as the scientists pointed out they cannot do this experiment on humans.
The life cycle of A. cantonensis is: Definitive host (rat, here) where adult worms are in the pulmonary arteries, eggs are released there and carried in the bloodstream to the lungs of the rat, eggs are swallowed and first stage larvae develop in the intestine, first stage larvae are passed in the feces which are then eaten by the intermediate molluscan hosts (such as the semi slug, snails) where they develop into third stage larvae. Infected molluscan hosts are then eaten by the rat (or human). In the rat, the cycle starts all over again.
I have heard that larger reptiles, such as the monitor lizard, that eat slugs and snails can have the third stage larvae in them and if eaten raw or undercooked can give a human a good dose. The planaria (those flat, slender bodied, wide headed worm like things that also get all over vegetables on the island) are also carriers of third stage larvae because they parasitize the slug and probably the eggs. I have seen them sucking on the bodies of semi slugs.
Anyway, thanks for the interest because it is only from being akamai that we can help prevent this horrible illness.
Thanks for the musings and things to think about Alaskasteven...As to the experiment with the rat and the slime, I am not sure this would prove anything except that the rat may or may not get the illness from the slime. Also the rat is the natural host and the human is not so the nematode will behave differently and eventually dies in the human. The question they may have is the number of third stage nematodes that a human must ingest in order to contract the illness. I would think that something more similar to a human would have to be tested in order to get some idea because as the scientists pointed out they cannot do this experiment on humans.
The life cycle of A. cantonensis is: Definitive host (rat, here) where adult worms are in the pulmonary arteries, eggs are released there and carried in the bloodstream to the lungs of the rat, eggs are swallowed and first stage larvae develop in the intestine, first stage larvae are passed in the feces which are then eaten by the intermediate molluscan hosts (such as the semi slug, snails) where they develop into third stage larvae. Infected molluscan hosts are then eaten by the rat (or human). In the rat, the cycle starts all over again.
I have heard that larger reptiles, such as the monitor lizard, that eat slugs and snails can have the third stage larvae in them and if eaten raw or undercooked can give a human a good dose. The planaria (those flat, slender bodied, wide headed worm like things that also get all over vegetables on the island) are also carriers of third stage larvae because they parasitize the slug and probably the eggs. I have seen them sucking on the bodies of semi slugs.
Anyway, thanks for the interest because it is only from being akamai that we can help prevent this horrible illness.