a b s t r a c t
Drug resistance is a problem wherever livestock are raised under intensive conditions and drugs are used
to combat parasitic infections. This is particularly true for the anticoccidial agents used for the prevention
of coccidiosis caused by protozoa of the apicomplexan genus Eimeria in poultry. Resistance has been documented
for all the dozen or so drugs approved for use in chickens and varying levels of resistance is
present for those currently employed. A possible solution may be the introduction of drug-sensitive parasites
into the houses where poultry are raised so that they may replace such drug-resistant organisms.
This can be achieved by utilizing live vaccines that contain strains of Eimeria that were isolated before
most anticoccidial compounds were introduced. Such strains are inherently drug-sensitive. Practical proposals
to achieve this objective involve the alternation of vaccination with medication (known as rotation
programs) in successive flocks reared in the same poultry house. A proposal for a yearly broiler production
cycle involving chemotherapy and vaccination is presented. There are few, if any, examples in veterinary
parasitology where it has proved possible to restore sensitivity to drugs used to control a
widespread parasite. Further research is necessary to ascertain whether this can result in sustainable
and long-term control of Eimeria infections in poultry.
2014 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd. on behalf of Australian Society for Parasitology Inc. This is
an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/).