Trichuris trichiura: Assessment of potential alternative diagnostic methods and efficacy of treatments in the African Green Monkey animal model (Chlorocebus sabaeus)

Abstract

Worldwide, most cases of trichuriasis remain undiagnosed, chronic infections remain undetected and an overall lack of understanding of potential zoonotic exposures prevails. Therefore, early diagnosis of trichuriasis and diagnostic methods that do not rely on inconsistent clinical signs or fecal analysis are crucial to detect infections following accidental ingestion and during prolonged prepatent period of the parasite. The difficulty of access to the parasitic material (feces and adult nematodes) and biological samples from the hosts, further threatens the development of alternative diagnostic methods. With our work, we show that the St. Kitts green monkey being naturally infected with T. trichiura, serves as a predictive disease modeling test system that facilitates preclinical evaluation having similar immunological responses as humans.