Giant snails as pets can be dangerous

They are both scary and fascinating at the same time. Giant snails are becoming increasingly popular as pets. Now researchers are warning

14-Nov-2023

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(dpa) Giant African snails up to 20 centimetres long are experiencing a boom as pets in Europe - a Swiss university is now warning against keeping them. The animals could be dangerous to humans, for example by transmitting the rat lungworm. This can cause meningitis in humans, reports a team of scientists from the University of Lausanne in the journal "parasites & Vectors". Around two thirds of the 36 pathogens known in snails could also infect humans.

Popular species for terrariums include the large agate snail (Lissachatina fulica) and the true agate snail (Achatina achatina).

"Social networks are full of photos of people touching animals with their skin or even their mouths," said researcher Cleo Bertelsmeier, according to a statement from the university. She teaches at the Institute of Ecology and Evolution at the Faculty of Biology and Medicine. People believe that the snail's mucus is good for the skin. However, this carries the risk of transmitting the pathogens.

Bertelsmeier and her colleagues had analyzed photos on social media to see how common the giant snails are as pets. Many people are not aware of the risks "to which they expose themselves or their children when they handle the snails, for example when they put them on their face", said co-author Jérôme Gippet.

Agate snails are voracious and reproduce quickly. The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) includes them on its list of dangerous invasive species and describes them as a pest. The animals eat all kinds of crops and could threaten agricultural land and biodiversity if they spread.

In the specialist article, the team from Lausanne calls for the public to be warned of the health risks and for the trade and possession of these animals to be regulated.

Note: This article has been translated using a computer system without human intervention. LUMITOS offers these automatic translations to present a wider range of current news. Since this article has been translated with automatic translation, it is possible that it contains errors in vocabulary, syntax or grammar. The original article in German can be found here.

Original publication

Jérôme M W Gippet, Olivia K Bates, Jérémie Moulin, Cleo Bertelsmeier; "The global risk of infectious disease emergence from giant land snail invasion and pet trade"; Parasites & Vectors, Volume 16, 2023-10-17

https://www.bionity.com/en/news/1182021/giant-snails-as-pets-can-be-dangerous.html