SARCOSPORIDIA : TRANSMISSION 285 



infection. It has been shown by Erdmann that, 

 should Sarcosporidian spores germinate in the in- 

 testine of a new host, their toxic sarcocystin is dis- 

 charged and the neighbouring intestinal epithelium 

 is destroyed. The spore-amoebulae are thus enabled 

 to find their way into the lymphatics, and later into 

 the musculature. 



Cannibalism may partly account for the transfer- 

 ence of infection from mouse to mouse. Contamina- 

 tion of food also aids. But large cattle and buffaloes 

 and fruit and insect-eating birds are not cannibal- 

 istic, and up to the present there is no proof that 

 the spores of Sarcosporidia occur in their faeces. 

 Some workers have suggested that flesh-flies and 

 meat-flies can act as carriers of spores. 



It has been stated that spores of Sarcocystis have 

 been seen in the circulating blood. This report 

 needs confirmation, but if true, it opens a new line 

 of research, since some blood-sucking insect or 

 arthropod (e.g., a tick) may be responsible for the 

 transference of the parasite from host to host. 

 While it is difficult to conceive of insects or ticks 

 being able to reach the spores embedded deep in the 

 oesophageal muscles of a sheep or buffalo, the intake 

 of spores, if present in the blood, would give rela- 

 tively little difficulty. Far more investigation is 

 needed on this point, and speculations on the sub- 

 ject are useless and premature. 



