The Effect of Anthelmintic Treatment on Coccidia Oocyst Shedding in a Wild Mammal Host with Intermittent Cestode Infection

Abstract

While hosts are routinely exploited by a community of parasite species, the principles governing host responses towards parasites are unclear. Identifying the health outcomes of coinfections involving helminth macroparasites and microparasites is one area of importance for public and domestic animal health. For instance, it is controversial how deworming programmes affect incidence and severity of such important microparasite diseases as malaria. One problem is that most study systems involve domestic and laboratory animals with conditions hardly comparable to those of free-living animals. Here, we study the effect of anthelmintic treatment on coccidia infection intensity in wild Alpine marmots, M. marmota. Our results lend support to the hypothesis that helminth infection has a positive effect on concurrent microparasite infection. However, our work also points to the fact that within-host interactions between helminths and microparasites are context-dependent and can turn to negative ones once helminth burdens increase. Our study suggests that coccidia benefit from intermittent helminth infection in marmots due to the protective effects of helminth infection only during the early phase of the host's active season. Also, the marmot's response towards coccidia infection appears optimal only under no helminth infection when the host immune response towards coccidia would not be compromised, thereby pointing to the importance of regular intestinal helminth elimination by marmots just before hibernation.

The Infection Rate of Bird-Feeding Ixodes ricinus Ticks with Borrelia garinii and B. valaisiana Varies with Host Haemosporidian Infection Status

“…Specifically, we found that the rates of ticks infected with bird-associated Borrelia spirochetes were lower if ticks fed on the hosts positive for avian haemosporidians. Therefore, this result is consistent with studies revealing that intracellular parasites, such as haemosporidians, can benefit from host immune systems prioritizing immune responses against extracellular parasites at the expense of immune responses against intracellular parasites [ 24 , 40 , 41 , 43 ]. The applicability of the hypothesis, based on the polarization of host immune responses, rests on the assumption that parasites eliciting conflicting immunological pathways are widespread in host populations.…”

“…within hosts [ 24 , 35 , 36 ]. Analogously to the studies on extracellular bacterial parasites, multiple studies found a positive role of extracellular intestinal parasites in the prevalence and parasitaemia of different apicomplexans [ 37 , 38 , 39 , 40 , 41 ].…”

Cross-sectional study of Eimeria species of poultry in Kwara State, North-Central Nigeria

“…The undefined pattern in the prevalence of Eimeria infection among poultry with the different anthelminthic treatment regimens appears to be dicey in explanation. Although, a study conducted on a species of wild mammal (Alpinemarmot, M. marmota latirostris) by Václav and Blazeková (2014), reported that helminth infection has a protective effect on the reproductive rates of coccidia parasites as the use of anthelmintic decreases the shedding rate of Eimeria oocysts.…”