Combes C
Centre de Biologie et d'Ecologie Tropicale et Méditerranéenne, Université, Perpignan, France.
Ann Parasitol Hum Comp. 1990;65 Suppl 1:59-64. doi: 10.1051/parasite/1990651059.
The Hominids have come in contact, over the last few million years, with the infective stages of many parasites which had up to then evolved in non Primate hosts; this is because Hominids have occupied multiple environments and acquired diversified behaviour. The high number of these lateral transfers explains the multiplicity of current human parasitic diseases whereas their youth on an evolutionary scale accounts for the seriousness of most of these diseases. The basic questions arising from the exceptional opportunities offered to parasites by the evolution of the human lineage concern: the precise role played by human behaviour, the mechanisms of alterations in specificity, the identity of the original host phyla, the dynamic and genetic consequences for parasites, the relationship with the evolutionary history of the ancestors of Homo sapiens sapiens; for instance, it is suggested that man's mastery of fire, allowing him to cook his food, dramatically reduced his contamination by certain parasites and that this contributed to the subsequent success of Hominids.
在过去几百万年里，原始人类接触到了许多寄生虫的感染阶段，而这些寄生虫此前一直在非灵长类宿主中进化；这是因为原始人类占据了多种环境并形成了多样化的行为。这些横向转移的数量众多，解释了当前人类寄生虫疾病的多样性，而从进化角度来看它们出现的时间较短，则说明了大多数此类疾病的严重性。人类谱系的进化为寄生虫提供了特殊机会，由此产生的基本问题包括：人类行为所起的精确作用、特异性改变的机制、原始宿主门类的身份、对寄生虫的动态和遗传影响、与智人祖先进化史的关系；例如，有人认为人类对火的掌握使他们能够烹饪食物，从而大幅减少了某些寄生虫的感染，这对原始人类后来的成功起到了推动作用。
