Assessing the impact of a joint human-porcine intervention package for Taenia solium control: Results of a pilot study from northern Lao PDR

•Taenia solium taeniasis prevalence was significantly reduced during the project lifetime.•First T. solium control intervention in Southeast Asia targeting both pigs and humans.•First demonstration globally of the impact of joint anthelmintic therapy on the adult T. solium parasite in human host.•These results are a timely contribution to the WHO Neglected Tropical Disease Roadmap. Following confirmation that a remote village of approximately 300 inhabitants in northern Lao PDR was hyperendemic for the Neglected Tropical Disease Taenia solium, a pilot human-porcine therapeutic control intervention was implemented between October 2013 and November 2014. Mass drug administration with a three day albendazole 400mg protocol was offered to all eligible humans in October 2013 and March 2014. At these times, and again in October 2014, eligible village pigs received the anti-cysticercosis TSOL18 vaccination and an oral dose of oxfendazole anthelmintic at 30mg/kg, both repeated one month later. Community and individual human taeniasis prevalences were estimated via copro-antigen ELISA of volunteered human faecal samples prior to October 2013, and again in January 2015, in order to examine the short term impact of the intervention.