The pork and beef tapeworms, Taenia solium and Taenia saginata respectively, are taeniid cestodes and major food-borne or meat-borne zoonoses. Human tapeworms and swine cysticerci have been known since Egyptian and Greek cultures. Nevertheless their association as part of the life cycle of the same parasite was only demonstrated during the nineteenth century. Kuchenmeister fed convicts with cysticerci excised from pork meat and found adult tapeworms in the intestine after autopsy, while van Beneden fed T. solium eggs to pigs and found numerous cysticerci in muscles after slaughter (Grove, 1990).
T. solium is the only causative agent of neurocysticercosis in humans and is, therefore, the more important of these species in public health. This chapter describes classical aspects of the morphology of the parasites as well as clinical aspects of the diseases they cause. Most importantly, detailed explanations of taxonomic aspects, specially related to the newly recognized Taenia asiatica are given. Furthermore, the epidemiology and transmission dynamics of the parasites, as well as intervention measures such as health education, mass drug treatment and vaccination, are described in detail. The chapter concludes with considerations on the surveillance and a discussion on prospects for the control of these cestode zoonoses.