Taeniasis and cysticercosis prevalence in a small village from Northeastern Brazil

• Autor(a) principal: Gomes,Irenio
• Data de Publicação: 2002
• Outros Autores: Veiga,Marielza, Embiruçu,Emília Katiane, Rabelo,Rosângela, Mota,Bernardo, Meza-Lucas,Antonio, Tapia-Romero,Raquel, Carrillo-Becerril,Bertha Laura, Alcántara-Anguiano,Isabel, Correa,Dolores, Melo,Ailton
• Tipo de documento: Artigo
• Idioma: eng
• Título da fonte: Arquivos de neuro-psiquiatria (Online)
• Texto Completo: http://old.scielo.br/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S0004-282X2002000200006
• topic: cysticercosis; taeniasis; epidemiology; prevalence; risk factors

Although not considered as an endemic region, the Northeast of Brazil has the necessary conditions for the development of taeniasis-cysticercosis complex. In a previous paper, we demonstrated that Mulungu do Morro municipality, in the State of Bahia, has a high seroprevalence to cysticercosis in epileptic patients. OBJECTIVE: to determine the prevalence of taeniasis and positive cysticercosis serology in the population of Mulungu do Morro. METHOD: blood and stool samples were collected from a random sampling of the population, by family. The identification of antibodies against T. solium cysticerci was made by EITB and T. solium antigens were identified using a polyclonal antibody-capture ELISA. RESULTS: the cysticercosis seroprevalence was 1.6% (C.I. = 0.8 to 2.8%) and the taeniasis prevalence 4.5% (C.I. = 3.0 to 6.5%). Seropositivity to cysticercosis was higher among those who lived in a house of a person testing positive for coproantigen, p=0.017. CONCLUSION: our results demonstrate that the taeniasis-cysticercosis complex is endemic in Mulungu do Morro. We believe that all areas in the world with the same socio-economic and sanitary characteristics are likely to have high prevalence of this parasite.