Hydro-epidemiological aspects of infectious agent indication in mollusks (review)

The article presents the rationale for the use of hydro-epidemiology in assessing the risk of spreading water-related in-fectious diseases of animals. The authors distinguish six hydro-epidemiological groups of diseases: 1) water is the medium of pathogen accumulation; 2) water is the medium for transmission of the infection pathogen without its biological accumula-tion; 3) the development cycle of the causative agent is directly related to water and aquatic organisms; 4) diseases transmitted by insects having water-related development cycle; 5) diseases transmitted by aquatic and near-water vertebrates; 6) diseases of reservoir inhabitants. At the same time, it is shown that the aquatic filter-feeding bivalves (mollusks) accumulate in them-selves various pathogenic microorganisms, which are the causative agents of infectious diseases of both man and animals. Thus, mollusks can serve as a test object for hydro-epidemiological study in assessing the risk of infectious diseases dissemi-nation in water area and near-water complex as well as in using them directly for food.