Children, snails and worms: the Brachylaima cribbi story

Abstract

Brachylaimids are parasitic trematode fluke worms that have a terrestrial life cycle involving land snails and slugs as the first and/or second intermediate hosts for the cercarial and metacercarial larval stages. A wide range of mammals, birds, reptiles and amphibians are the definitive hosts for the adult worm. Brachylaima spp. have been reported from most continents including Europe, Africa, Asia, North and South America and Australia. There are over 70 described species in the genus with seven species indigenous to Australia. Although Brachylaima spp. are a cosmopolitan terrestrial trematode they have not been recorded to infect humans other than the three Brachylaima cribbi infections reported in two children and an adult from South Australia.