Standardization of canine infections for the development of antileishmanial drugs

Abstract

Chemotherapy of leishmaniasis, both human and canine, is far from ideal and new antileishmanial drugs are urgently needed. Therapeutic arsenal against the disease is old, of low antileishmanial efficacy and hampered by toxicity issues in some cases. Furthermore, hospitalization required for some drugs, the price of the safer presentations is high and there are growing reports of leishmanial resistance to first line medicines. In addition to human visceral cases, canine infections by Leishmania infantum represent a first order veterinary pathology with dogs being the main reservoir for this zoonotic infection. Thus, dog infections by L. infantum are needed to develop veterinary drugs and are the best surrogate model for human leishmaniasis. Many contributions on the efficacy of new drugs or presentations in dogs have been published but the variety of experimental designs makes comparisons challenging thus reducing their value. Present study offers a comprehensive review of canine experimental infections with visceral Leishmania, with a particular focus on L. infantum. The review encompasses a range of topics, including animal housing, regulatory aspects, ethical considerations, infection methods, follow-up procedures, and outcomes. The final aim of our contribution is to promote the standardization of some experimental procedures to enhance the comparability of the studies performed. This, in turn, is expected to reduce the use of animals and to increase the efficiency of drug discovery and development