title: The role of antiparasite treatment experiments in assessing the impact of parasites on wildlife.
abstract: It has become increasingly clear that parasites can have significant impacts on the dynamics of wildlife populations. Recently, researchers have shifted from using observational approaches to infer the impact of parasites on the health and fitness of individuals to using antiparasite drug treatments to test directly the consequences of infection. However, it is not clear the extent to which these experiments work in wildlife systems, or whether the results of these individual-level treatment experiments can predict the population-level consequences of parasitism. Here, we assess the results of treatment experiments, laying out the benefits and limitations of this approach, and discuss how they can be used to improve our understanding of the role of parasites in wildlife populations.
authors.affiliation: Institute of Evolutionary Biology & Centre for Immunity, Infection, and Evolution, School of Biological Sciences, Kings Buildings, Ashworth Laboratories, Charlotte Auerbach Road, Edinburgh, EH9 3FL, UK. Electronic address: amy.pedersen@ed.ac.uk.
authors.forename: Amy B
authors.initials: AB
authors.lastname: Pedersen
authors.affiliation: Institute of Integrative Biology, Biosciences Building, Crown Street, Liverpool, L69 7ZB, UK.
authors.forename: Andy
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Fenton
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D000835:Animals, Wild / Q000469:parasitology*; D000977:Antiparasitic Agents / Q000494:pharmacology / Q000627:therapeutic use*; D006790:Host-Parasite Interactions / Q000187:drug effects / Q000502:physiology*; D008954:Models, Biological; D010273:Parasitic Diseases, Animal / Q000188:drug therapy* / Q000473:pathology
chemical_list: D000977:Antiparasitic Agents
keywords: anthelmintic; fecundity; fitness; ivermectin; population dynamics; survival