I have so many questions! Can anyone comment on the significance of doing this research in a zoo? I'm guessing it was a crime of opportunity since that's where

I have so many questions! Can anyone comment on the significance of doing this research in a zoo? I'm guessing it was a crime of opportunity since that's where zoologists work and can easily collect dead animals, but what does that mean for the research? Is it likely to be a representative sample of animals in the wild, despite the exposure to exotic animals from all over the world? If they were exposed there and a population established itself among zoo rats, how likely is it to spread from there? What's up with that life cycle? Rat to snail seems like a weird combo. Usually parasites' lifecycle is a little more obvious like Leucochloridium paradoxum which infects snails that are then eaten by birds, who spread the eggs via droppings, or Toxoplasma gondii which gives rats a hankering for cat pee. What's the deal with the snails? Did the parasite just evolve in a field somewhere, where snails frequently came into contact with field rat droppings? I wonder how many more pathogens are just waiting for some lucky exposure to break into the human population. Even before COVID brought that idea front and center, I remember going down a wikipedia rabbit hole during the Ebola outbreak and there is some terrifying stuff out there like hendra and nipah viruses with >50% mortality rates.