A rodent model for pulmonary paragonimiasis

This study reports a model of pulmonary paragonimiasis in outbred Wistar rats using the Indian strain of Paragonimus heterotremus isolated from the fresh water crab Barytelphusa lugubris collected from Arunachal Pradesh, India. Feeding metacercariae to the rats led to encapsulated adult worms in the lungs and pleural cavity. Some flukes migrated to the skeletal muscles of the hosts where they remained underdeveloped as immature flukes.