Protistan parasites have an undisputed global health impact. However, outside of a few key exceptions, e.g. the agent of malaria, most of these infectious agents are neglected as important health threats. The Symposium entitled “Free-living amoebae and neglected pathogenic protozoa: health emergency signals?” held at the European Congress of Protistology in Rome, July 2019, brought together researchers addressing scientific and clinical questions about some of these fascinating organisms. Topics presented included the molecular basis of pathogenicity in Acanthamoeba; genomics of Naegleria fowleri; and epidemiology of poorly diagnosed enteric protistan species, including Giardia, Cryptosporidium, Blastocystis, Dientamoeba. The Symposium aim was to excite the audience about the opportunities and challenges of research in these underexplored organisms and to underline the public health implications of currently under-appreciated protistan infections. The major take home message is that any knowledge that we gain about these organisms will allow us to better address them, in terms of monitoring and treatment, as sources of future health emergencies.

Protistan寄生虫对全球健康的影响无可争议。但是，除了一些主要的例外情况（例如疟疾的病因）外，大多数这些传染病被视为对健康的重要威胁。题为“自由活动的变形虫和被忽视的病原虫：健康紧急信号？”的专题讨论会 该会议于2019年7月在罗马举行的欧洲Protistology大会上举行，汇集了研究人员，探讨了有关其中一些令人着迷的生物的科学和临床问题。提出的主题包括棘阿米巴的致病性的分子基础; 内毛菜的基因组学; 和诊断不佳的肠道protistan物种的流行病学，包括贾第虫，隐孢子虫，胚芽孢杆菌，Dientamoeba。专题讨论会的目的是激发观众对这些未充分开发的生物体进行研究的机遇和挑战，并强调目前未充分认识到的普鲁斯坦感染对公共健康的影响。重要的带回家的信息是，我们获得的有关这些生物的任何知识都将使我们能够在监测和治疗方面更好地解决它们，作为未来突发卫生事件的根源。