<unk>  is considered as “tools-ready disease” according to WHO. International Task Force for Disease Eradication in 1992 reported that<unk>  is potentially eradicable. It is feasible because there are no animal reservoirs besides humans and pigs. The only source of Taenia solium infection for pigs is from humans, a definite host. Theoretically, breaking the life cycle seems easy by doing intervention strategies from various stages in the life cycle. For example, # Massive chemotherapy of infected individuals, improving sanitation, and educating people are all major ways to discontinue the cycle, in which eggs from human feces are transmitted to other humans and/or pigs. # Cooking of pork or freezing it and inspecting meat are effective means to cease the life cycle # The management of pigs by treating them or vaccinating them is another possibility to intervene # The separation of pigs from human faeces by confining them in enclosed piggeries. In Western European countries post World War 2 the pig industry developed rapidly and most pigs were housed. This was the main reason for pig<unk>  largely being eliminated from the region. This of course is not a quick answer to the problem in developing countries. Pigs The intervention strategies to eradicate<unk>  includes surveillance of pigs in foci of transmission and massive chemotherapy treatment of humans. In reality, control of T. solium by a single intervention, for instance, by treating only human population will not work because the existing infected pigs can still carry on the cycle. The proposed strategy for eradication is to do multilateral intervention by treating both human and porcine populations. It is feasible because treating pigs with oxfendazole has been shown to be effective and once treated, pigs are protected from further infections for at least 3 months. Limitations Even with the concurrent treatment of humans and pigs, complete elimination is hard to achieve. In one study conducted in 12 villages in Peru, both humans and pigs were treated with praziquantel and oxfendazole, with the coverage of more than 75% in humans and 90% in pigs The result shows a decrease in prevalence and incidence in the intervention area; however the effect did not eliminate T. solium. The possible reason includes the incomplete coverage and re-infection. Even though T. solium could be eliminated through mass treatment of human and porcine population, it is not sustainable. Moreover, both tapeworm carriers of humans and pigs tend to spread the disease from endemic to non-endemic areas resulting in periodic outbreaks of<unk>  or outbreaks in new areas. Vaccines Given the fact that pigs are part of a life cycle, vaccination of pigs is another feasible intervention to eliminate<unk> . Research studies have been focusing on vaccine against cestode parasites, since many immune cell types are found to be capable of destroying cysticercus. Many vaccine candidates are extracted from antigens of different cestodes such as Taenia solium, T. crassiceps, T. saginata, T. ovis and target oncospheres and/or cysticerci. In 1983, Molinari et al. reported the first vaccine candidate against porcine<unk>  using antigen from cysticercus cellulosae drawn out from naturally infected. Recently, vaccines extracted from genetically engineered 45W-4B antigens have been successfully tested to pigs in an experimental condition. This type of vaccine can protect against<unk>  in both Chinese and Mexican type of T. solium. However, it has not been tested in endemic field conditions, which is important because the realistic condition in the field differ greatly from experimental condition, and this can result in a great difference in the chances of infection and immune reaction. Even though vaccines have been successfully generated, the feasibility of its production and usage in rural free ranging pigs still remains a challenge. If a vaccine is to be injected, the burden of work and the cost of vaccine administration to pigs will remain high and unrealistic. The incentives of using vaccines by pig owners will decrease if the vaccine administration to pigs takes time by injecting every single pig in their livestock. A hypothetical oral vaccine is proposed to be more effective in this case as it can be easily delivered to the pigs by food. S3PVAC vaccine The vaccine constituted by 3 peptide synthetically produced (S3Pvac) has proven its efficacy in natural conditions of transmission. The S3PVAC vaccine so far, can be considered as the best vaccine candidate to be used in endemic areas such as Mexico (20). S3Pvac consists of three protective peptides: KETc12, KETc1 and GK1, whose sequences belong to native antigens that are present in the different developmental stages of T. solium and other cestode parasites. Non-infected pigs from rural villages in Mexico were vaccinated with S3Pvac and the vaccine reduced 98% the number of cysticerci and 50% the number of prevalence. The diagnostic method involves necropsy and tongue inspection of pigs. The natural challenge conditions used in the study proved the efficacy of the S3Pvac vaccine in transmission control of T. solium in Mexico. The S3Pvac vaccine is owned by the National Autonomous University of Mexico and the method of high scale production of the vaccine has already been developed. The validation of the vaccine in agreement with the Secretary of Animal Health in Mexico is currently in the process of completion. It is also hoped that the vaccine will be well-accepted by pig owners because they also lose their income if pigs are infected<unk> . Vaccination of pigs against<unk> , if succeeded, can potentially have a great impact on transmission control since there is no chance of re-infection once pigs receive vaccination. Other<unk>  can also be prevented by routine inspection of meat and condemnation of measly meat by the local government and by avoiding partially cooked meat products. However, in areas where food is scarce, cyst-infected meat might be considered as wasted since pork can provide high quality protein. At times, infected pigs are consumed within the locality or sold at low prices to traffickers who take the uninspected pigs at urban areas for sale.
Cysticercosis
Neurocysticercosis
Granulomatous amoebic encephalitis
Meningeal syphilis
Sappinia amoebic encephalitis
Balamuthia infection
Amoebic brain abscess
Powassan encephalitis