Contribution of experimental models to the understanding of immunity to schistosomiasis]

The discovery of a functional division in T helper cells on the basis of their cytokine secretion patterns has changed our vision of immunological responses. This dichotomy has equally shown the complexity of immune responses since there is a well orchestrated cross-regulation of cytokine production induced by viral, bacterial or parasitic pathogens. In the context of type 1-type 2 cytokine pattern, mice has been universally and extensively used to associate an infectious disease according to each category in order to better understand human infections. However, with respect to schistosomiasis, immunological observations in mice have not been confirmed in humans and particularly the nature of the protective immune response. This report will consider the relevance of extrapolating from immunological studies on schistosome in experimentally infected rats to studies on naturally infected humans.