Human and animal invasive muscular sarcocystosis in Malaysia - Recent cases, review and hypotheses

Sarcocystosis, an unusual parasitic zoonotic disease, is caused by coccidian/ apicomplexan protozoa in humans and animals. The parasites usually develop in a heteroxenous predator-prey life-cycle involving final (carnivore) and intermediate (omnivore/herbivore) hosts. Besides the intestinal, non-inv...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Tropical Biomedicine
Main Author: Tappe D.; Abdullah S.; Heo C.C.; Kannan Kutty K.; Latif B.
Format: Review
Language:English
Published: 2013
Online Access:https://www.scopus.com/inward/record.uri?eid=2-s2.0-84884739144&partnerID=40&md5=77bb1d4755ce1d2783da5ca28ce16d2a
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Summary:Sarcocystosis, an unusual parasitic zoonotic disease, is caused by coccidian/ apicomplexan protozoa in humans and animals. The parasites usually develop in a heteroxenous predator-prey life-cycle involving final (carnivore) and intermediate (omnivore/herbivore) hosts. Besides the intestinal, non-invasive form of the disease in which humans and animals are the definitive hosts for certain Sarcocystis spp., the invasive form has come to recent attention. In the latter, humans and animals serve as intermediate host harbouring sarcocysts in their muscle tissue. Already in 1991 sarcocystosis was seen as a potential emerging food-borne zoonosis in Malaysia, and in 2011 and 2012 the largest cluster of symptomatic human muscular sarcocystosis world-wide was reported from Tioman Island, Pahang state. In this review, we focus on invasive sarcocystosis in humans and animals in Malaysia, review the recorded cases and epidemiology, and present hypotheses.
ISSN:01275720