Pathology of the Disease in Sheep Produced Experimentally by <i>Trypanosoma brucei</i>

Abstract

Sheep inoculated intravenously with Trypanosoma brucei had fever, irregular parasitaemia, moderate anaemia, subcutaneous oedema, dullness, anorexia, and nervous signs followed by death in 29–69 days. Emaciation, serous effusions into body cavities and generalised enlargement and oedema of lymph nodes were seen at necropsy. Microscopically there was extensive localisation of trypanosomes in the extravascular body fluids, and in interstitial connective tissues, resulting in mononuclear inflammatory reactions in the heart, skeletal muscle, skin, brain, pituitary, eye, serosal surfaces, urinary bladder, epididymis and testis, and in generalised lymphoid hyperplasia. These observations in sheep are comparable to those made in other animals infected with trypanosomes of the brucei group.