sanguisuga Blood Meals and Potential for

To evaluate human risk for Chagas disease, we mo-lecularly identified blood meal sources and prevalence of Trypanosoma cruzi infection among 49 Triatoma sanguisu-ga kissing bugs in Louisiana, USA. Humans accounted for the second most frequent blood source. Of the bugs that fed on humans, ≈40 % were infected with T. cruzi, revealing transmission potential. Chagas disease, caused by the parasite Trypanosoma cruzi, is mainly transmitted to humans and other mam-mals by blood-sucking insects called triatomines (also known as kissing bugs). In the United States, 24 species of wild mammals have been found to be naturally infected with T. cruzi, but only a few (<25) autochthonous cases of vectorial transmission to humans have been described (1,2). This number is probably an underestimate, and there is concern that vectorial transmission to humans in the Unit