A parasite that could potentially kill your pet dog has been discovered lurking in a section of the Colorado River that runs through Southern California.
This parasite is a flatworm named Heterobilharzia americana, also known as a liver fluke, and has previously only been found in Texas and other states on the Gulf Coast.
However, a new paper in the journal Pathogens reports that it has been discovered in California for the first time.
The liver fluke is a parasitic flatworm that infects mammals—mostly dogs—and is most commonly encountered in regions such as Texas, Louisiana and Florida. When it infects dogs, it can cause a condition known as schistosomiasis, which can damage a dog’s liver and intestines and potentially be fatal.
“Dogs can die from this infection, so we are hoping to raise public awareness that it’s there,” paper co-author Adler Dillman, a nematology professor at the University of California, Riverside, said in a statement. “If you’re swimming in the Colorado River with them, your pets are in peril.”
Eleven dogs across three California counties have been infected with this parasite since 2019, one of which has died. This drove the researchers to investigate a river in Blythe, a town on the Arizona Border east of Joshua Tree National Park in Riverside County, where all the infected dogs had swum. In the river—which is a part of the Colorado River—they collected over 2,000 snails and found that several were host species of the liver fluke.
