Parasitic contamination in the soil of public parks from northern Brazil

Public parks are an important source of contamination by parasites due to the high flow of people and animals. We aimed to evaluate the prevalence of intestinal parasites in the soil of public parks from Belém, northern Brazil, as well as compare the degrees of parasitism in squares analyzed, the frequency of parasites found according to parasitological methods and verify the conditions of squares on collection day. This was a cross-sectional analytical study carried out during October 2020. The forty samples from four squares were analyzed by Hoffman, Faust and Baermman modified methods. The results showed that 72.5% of samples were parasitized and 100% of squares were contaminated with intestinal parasites. Moreover, polyparasitism was predominant in contaminated samples and Baermann-Moraes method was the most sensitive in the detection of helminths. Blastocystis hominis (47.2%) and hookworms (52.5%) were the most found species. Thus, this study showed parasitic contamination in all of the squares analyzed, which may be associated with poor sanitary from the city of Belém and reinforce the adoption of preventive measures to reduce the parasitic contamination on squares.