Epidemiological study of paragonimosis in central China

To determine the prevalence of paragonimosis and some of the epidemiological factors responsible for the infection, a community-based epidemiological study of Paragonimus infection was carried out. The overall seroprevalence of Paragonimus infection was 16.3 %. Prevalence rates tended to decrease with age, ranging from 35.7 % in children under 7 years of age to 4.2 % in those over 45 years old. Females showed a higher prevalence (24.3 %) than males (11.3 %). They acquired the infection mainly by eating raw freshwater crabs. The commonest crab recovered was Sinopotamon honanses with 40 % (48/120) of crabs infected with metacercariae. The P. skrjabini adult worms and ova were obtained from the rats experimentally infected with metacercariae collected from the crabs. The results showed that Henan province was an endemic area of paragonimosis caused by P. skrjabini.