Waterborne toxoplasmosis--recent developments
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Updated: Jun 24, 2026

Obtaining Highly Purified Toxoplasma gondii Oocysts by a Discontinuous Cesium Chloride Gradient
Published on: November 3, 2009
1Division of Parasitic Diseases, National Center for Zoonotic, Vectorborne and Enteric Diseases, Coordinating Center for Infectious Diseases, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 4770 Buford Highway, MS: F22, Chamblee, GA 30341, USA. JLJ1@CDC.GOV
Abstract:
Humans become infected with Toxoplasma gondii mainly by ingesting uncooked meat containing viable tissue cysts or by ingesting food or water contaminated with oocysts from the feces of infected cats. Circumstantial evidence suggests that oocyst-induced infections in humans are clinically more severe than tissue cyst-acquired infections. Until recently, waterborne transmission of T. gondii was considered uncommon, but a large human outbreak linked to contamination of a municipal water reservoir in Canada by wild felids and the widespread infection of marine mammals in the USA provided reasons to question this view. The present paper examines the possible importance of T. gondii transmission by water.
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