PREVALENCIA DE Angiostrongylus cantonensis (NEMATODA: METASTRONGYLIDAE), PARÁSITO DEL CARACOL AFRICANO EN CHONE

Abstract

Approximately a decade ago there was an outbreak of patients with eosinophilic meningoencephalitis in Ecuador, which led to the suspicion of the presence of Angiostrongylus cantonensis, a recently distributed parasite in some countries of Latin America. In 2008, its presence in the country was confirmed. The objective of this work was to determine the prevalence of Angiostrongylus cantonensis, parasite of the African snail Achatina fulica in the canton Chone, for which methods such as the technique of Lobato and Parense were used for the extraction of the pallial membranes. The parasite larvae were counted by microsurgery and microscopy techniques. A total of 151 snails were collected distributed as follows: 63 of 3 urban ÁREAs (37 belonging to the street 7 de Agosto, 8 of the Ciudadela 6 de Diciembre, and 18 of Santa Rita) and 88 of three rural ÁREAs of Chone (50 from Ricaurte, 27 San Antonio, and 11 from Boyacá) for the study. All were processed in the Research Laboratory of the UTM. It was concluded that the prevalence in Canton Chone of A. cantonensis is 23.84%. However, it is important to emphasize that of the 6 localities investigated only in one locality positive cases were found. The prevalence in this locality was 97.3%, with a total abundance of 69.2 and an intensity of 298.82 (maximum of 1155 and a minimum of 34 larvae of the nematode per parasitized membrane). It is concluded that due to the high prevalence found, it is important to carry out health awareness campaigns aimed at medical personnel to be included in the differential diagnosis of meningitis and, above all, it is essential to alert the population with the necessary prevention measures since this parasite is responsible for the greatest number of cases presented with eosinophilic meningoencephalitis in humans