On 29–30 June 2026, COST Action CA21105 (“Blastocystis under One Health”) held its international roundtable workshop, “Clinical Perspectives of Blastocystis,” at the Department of Medical Parasitology, Kasr Al-Ainy Faculty of Medicine, Cairo University, Egypt. Co-chaired by Dr. Anastasios Tsaousis (University of Kent, UK; our Action Chair) and Prof. Ayman A. El-Badry (Cairo University, Egypt), the two-day event brought together some 15 experts spanning infectious disease medicine, gastroenterology, clinical microbiology and parasitology, molecular epidemiology, microbiome science, veterinary parasitology, public health, and diagnostics.
The workshop was an outstanding success. Across 20 structured sessions and three keynote talks, participants engaged in rich, substantive discussion covering Blastocystis biology, transmission, clinical spectrum, diagnostics, and management. The roundtable reached consensus on a provisional clinical case definition of blastocystosis and a five-step clinical management algorithm, and ranked a set of priority research questions to guide the field going forward. These outputs will be developed into a consensus statement and a high-impact review/perspective article for submission to a leading journal, alongside a diagnostic algorithm and a One Health policy brief for the Action.
We are especially grateful to Cairo University and the Kasr Al-Ainy Faculty of Medicine, and to our local organisers Abeer Mahgoub, Nadia El-Dib, Ayman A. El-Badry, and Iman Rafaat, for their generous support and warm hospitality in hosting this event. The workshop demonstrated the strength of collaboration within COST Action CA21105 and has laid the groundwork for new joint projects among participating institutions.
