ABSTRACT

Lung flukes of the genus Paragonimus are zoonotic agents of paragonimiasis in animals and humans. Their life cycle requires at least three hosts: freshwater snails as the first and crustaceans as the second intermediate hosts. Carnivorous/omnivorous mammals, including humans, act as definitive hosts and are infected through eating freshwater crabs or crayfish containing live metacercariae (infective stage larvae) of lung flukes. 1 In addition, humans may become infected through ingestion of raw meat of mammalian paratenic hosts such as wild boars. 2 Adult worms normally live in pairs in cysts in the lungs causing typical pulmonary lesions. However, they may parasitize various other sites in the body to cause extrapulmonary paragonimiasis (ectopic paragonimiasis), for example, the abdominal wall, 3 liver, 4 pancreas, 5 and more notably, the brain. 6