A new flotation technique for the extraction of Toxocara eggs from soil has been devised. It has a fairly high recovery efficiency for Toxocara eggs, can be used for replicated quantitative experiments, and may also be used for recovery of other ascarid eggs from soil.

A survey was carried out at Kano abattoir in order to estimate the incidence of hydatidosis and cysticercosis in slaughtered livestock. Of the animal species examined, hydatid disease was found in sheep (11.4 per cent), goats (26.5 per cent), cattle (14.7 per cent) and camels (55.5 per cent). Cysticercus tenuicollis was found to be most prevalent in goats (34.2 per cent), followed by sheep (21.4 per cent) and cattle (0.1 per cent). Out of 4844 cattle examined, less than 2 per cent haboured Cysticercus bovis cysts; while Cysticercus ovis cysts were found in sheep (1 per cent) and goats (0.8 per cent).

A retrospective analysis of hospital records in 3 ecological zones of Nigeria was carried out to ascertain the prevalence of human taeniasis, cysticercosis and hydatidosis.The prevalence of Taenia infection in Sudan, Bauchi Plateau and Northern Guinea zones wa 0.9%, 0.6% and 0.6% respectively. The prevalence of human taeniasis by age and sex in the 3 ecological zones indicates that males were more often infected. Because males by habit eat more “suya” (half-grilled beef) than females, they are more likely to be exposed to Taenia saginata cysts. As for age factor, Taenia infection was more common up to the age of 40.Human hydatidosis was recorded only once in the Sudan zone and was not recorded at all in the Northern Guinea and Bauchi zones. Human cysticercosis was not documented in any of the three ecological zones covered by the survey.It is suspected that the low prevalence or the non-documentation of some of these diseases is due to poor diagnostic facilitis and inefficient disease-recording system.

Infection of dogs with Echinococcus gramulosus is recorded for the first time in Kaduna State. Observations on 330 dogs from different suburbs revealed an incidence of 1.2 per cent. Of slaughtered stock examined, hydatid cyst infections were found in sheep (7.1 per cent), goats (18.4 per cent), cattle (1.5 per cent), camels (70.9 per cent) and pigs (5 per cent).

Out of a total of 282 soil samples obtained from public areas, 58 samples contained Toxocara spp. eggs. This gave an overall prevalence of 20.6%. Highway rest areas were contaminated and childrens sand boxes had the highest percentage of recovery of all.