Behaviour and eating habits as determinants for human opisthorchiasis in the Bolsena Lake area, Italy.

In Italy, food-borne outbreaks of opisthorchiasis have occurred since 2003, all of them originating from some lakes in Central Italy where the only European liver fluke, Opisthorchis felineus (Rivolta, 1884) is endemic. The aim of the present study is to investigate the factors that may facilitate the life cycle of O. felineus in the area of Bolsena Lake, the knowledge of the local population about opisthorchiasis, and preventative healthcare measures.

Early respiratory infections: the role of passive smoking in gene-environment interaction.

This study aims to: (i) estimate genetic and environmental components of four early respiratory diseases and (ii) test if these components are modified by parental smoking exposure. Study subjects were 2068 Italian twins aged 3-17. We performed biometric modeling under the assumptions of the twin design.