Lainson R
Wellcome Parasitology Unit, Instituto Evandro Chagas, Belém, Pará, Brasil.
Philos Trans R Soc Lond B Biol Sci. 1988 Oct 31;321(1207):389-404. doi: 10.1098/rstb.1988.0099.
Epidemiological studies on the leishmaniases are disclosing a multiplicity of Leishmania species infecting a wide range of wild mammalian hosts, from marsupials to monkeys. In the primitive, silvatic habitat these parasites are transmitted by an equally wide variety of phlebotomine sandfly species (Diptera: Psychodidae: Phlebotominae). Transmission is not haphazard, however, and available evidence points to the existence of environmental barriers that normally limit the different Leishmania species to specific sandfly vectors, transmitting to certain mammalian species, within distinct ecotopes. In this situation, humans may become infected by a variety of leishmanial parasites when intruding into the different enzootics, if the sandfly vectors are anthropophilic. Many are not, however, and their parasites rarely, if ever, make contact with the human host. Natural or man-made ecological changes may result in modification of the epidemiological pattern of leishmaniasis, leading to either a reduction or an increase in the human disease.
关于利什曼病的流行病学研究揭示，多种利什曼原虫感染着从有袋动物到猴子等广泛的野生哺乳动物宿主。在原始的森林生境中，这些寄生虫由同样多样的白蛉物种（双翅目：毛蠓科：白蛉亚科）传播。然而，传播并非随机发生，现有证据表明存在环境屏障，这些屏障通常将不同的利什曼原虫物种限制在特定的白蛉媒介中，在不同的生态位内传播给特定的哺乳动物物种。在这种情况下，如果白蛉媒介嗜人，人类侵入不同的动物疫源地时可能会感染多种利什曼原虫寄生虫。然而，许多白蛉并非嗜人，它们携带的寄生虫很少（如果有的话）与人类宿主接触。自然或人为的生态变化可能导致利什曼病流行病学模式的改变，从而导致人类疾病的减少或增加。
