A parasitic disease which affects more than 200 million of the world’s poorest people is transmitted between humans and their livestock through “hybrid” flatworms, a UK-funded project has found.
Schistosomiasis, a chronic disease caused by parasitic flatworms which leads to an intestine or urinary tract infection, is common in communities without access to safe drinking water and sanitation.
While efforts to control the disease have been partially successful, they have been limited by the flatworms ability to rapidly adapt and evolve.
But in an announcement on Monday, scientists working in West Africa said that growing hotspots of the disease are driven by the emergence of highly infectious “hybrid” parasites, formed when species of schistosome from both livestock and humans combine.
The research finding, which the World Health Organisation have incorporated into treatment guidelines, will have a significant impact on stemming the transmission and spread of the disease.
“That this species of really nasty parasitic worm can survive in livestock as well as humans is really unexpected,” said Prof Charlotte Watts, Chief Scientific Adviser at the Department for International Development (Dfid). “Before, we assumed [disease transmission] was always from a cycle between worms.
“This finding is really important in terms of public health and demonstrates the huge potential for science to really make a difference,” she added.
The research is among a number of projects releasing findings on Monday as part of a UK government strategy to invest in zoonotic diseases, which can be passed from animals to humans.
Such illnesses, which can devastate livestock and could be the source of the next global pandemic, are estimated to have cost the world more than $20 billion directly and $200 billion indirectly between 2000 and 2010.
“A billion people around the world depend on farming and livestock as a source of income,” said Penny Mordaunt, International Development Secretary.
“By protecting cows and chickens from infections and tackling diseases that spread from animals to humans – like avian flu – UK aid is protecting them, supporting their livelihoods and reducing the risk of pandemics that could reach our shores.”
In a project in Tanzania, scientists found that the insecticides farmers used to control ticks and flies on livestock also prevented the transmission of sleeping sickness, a deadly neglected disease spread by tsetse flies, from wildlife to humans.
Another team identified a link between growing brucellosis infections and the rise of farming sheep and goats, which are becoming more popular to farm as they are less vulnerable to changing climates than cattle.
“What I’m excited about is the range of really important diseases that these projects are tackling,” said Prof Watts. “[Dfid] are fundamentally committed to trying to help the world’s poorest people, and we know that agriculture is a really important area.
“But what we also know is that animals, both wildlife and livestock, are an important source of new infections to humans. How we invest overseas has an impact on the UK as well as global health security.”
Dfid also announced on Monday an additional £2.5 million for six projects in the Zoonoses and Emerging Livestock Systems (ZELS) scheme, taking the total invested by the UK to over £23 million.
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