Chapter 3

Endemic Chagas Disease

Antonio Teixeira, Rubens Nascimento and Nancy R Sturm

Abstract

Infections by Trypanosoma cruzi are transmitted commonly by triatomines, hematophagous insects adapted to anthropophilic behavior. With its potential enzootic presence for over 90 million years, Chagas disease in humans has been documented in 9 thousand-year-old mummies from the Atacama Desert. Lately, Chagas disease has shown exponential growth because European and African colonizers dwelling in huts infested by triatomines contaminated with T. cruzi were promptly infected. Nowadays, Chagas disease affects 18 million people and is considered the most lethal endemic infectious disease in the Western Hemisphere.

Total Pages: 10-17 (8)

Purchase Chapter  Book Details