ABSTRACT
Intestinal Cestodes of the phylum Platyhelminthes (flatworms) are parasitic as adults in the alimentary tract or associated ducts of vertebrates. Tape - worms causing human disease are Taenia solium, Taenia saginata, Asian Taenia, Echinococcus granulosis, Echinococcus multilocularis, Hymenolepsis nana, Hymenolepsis diminuta and Diphyllobothrium latum. Morphologically, each tapeworm consists of a head (scolex), a neck or germinal region, and a segmented body (strobila). The scolex may contain holdfast organs such as rounded muscular sucking discs, hooklets, or elongated grooves (bothria) which enable the adult worm to hold fast to the mucosa of the gut. The neck gives rise to the sequential, chain-like linear array of male and female reproductive organs (proglottids) that become progressively more mature as they are moved distally by differentiation of younger proglottids in the neck. Each proglottid is a selfcontained hermaphroditic reproductive unit. Enlarged (gravid) proglottids may contain enormous numbers of eggs (for example, more than 100 000/proglottid in Taenia species).
