Research overview: blood parasite diversity across African carnivores including felids

African carnivores, including lions, leopards and cheetahs, host a rich diversity of blood-borne parasites that molecular surveys continue to uncover. This overview surveys the diversity of hemoparasites, such as Babesia, Hepatozoon, Anaplasma and trypanosomes, found across African felids and other carnivores, the vectors that transmit them, and the generally tolerated nature of these infections punctuated by occasional disease. It examines how shared parasites link carnivore species and prey within ecosystems, and how surveys reveal previously unrecognized parasite lineages. The synthesis connects molecular parasitology to community disease ecology. It aims to help readers appreciate the hidden parasitic diversity coursing through the blood of African cats, and how cataloguing these organisms illuminates the web of vector-borne infections that connects felids to the broader carnivore community.