Order Kinetoplastida

 

·        Part of the Subphylum Mastigophora

·        Difficult to treat – drugs containing antimony are the still the standard of care

·        High plasticity in morphology among invertebrate and vertebrate hosts.  Note differences in morphology in Leishmania spp. below:

Generalized life cycle for Leishmania spp.

 

Leishmania_LifeCycle