High levels of infectiousness of asymptomatic Leishmania (Viannia) braziliensis infections in wild rodents highlights their importance in the epidemiology of American Tegumentary Leishmaniasis in Brazil.

The results support the view that a collective assemblage of wild and synanthropic rodent species is an important wild reservoir of L. (V.) braziliensis in this region, with N. squamipes and R. rattus probably playing a key role in transmission within and between habitat types and rodent species. Rodents, and by implication humans, are at risk of infection in all sampled habitats, but more so in homestead plantations. These conclusions are based on one of the longest CMR study of small rodents in an American Tegumentary Leishmaniasis (ATL) foci.