Will you start avoiding certain food if we tell you that worms can occupy your brain? These worms reside in the brain as parasites, and they can cause severe damages.
Several years ago, a man was examined because of his constant headaches as part of a study conducted in Cambridge.
This man reported that prior to these examinations, he visited China.
This country is known to have the most cases of Spirometra erinaceieuropaei parasite, which was spread through Japan, Thailand and South Korea too.
The worm was causing not only headaches, but also weakness and seizures.
This man was diagnosed with sparganosis, which is a parasitic infection caused by tapeworm larvae plerocercois diphyllobothroid.
Since this type of infection can’t be treated with medications, the man needed to undergo a surgery.
There are various types of tapeworms, but just 3 of them may infect the brain, especially the pork tapeworm.
This brain infection can appear from consuming under cooked pork which was previously infected by this parasite. This can result in taeniasis, which is a disease caused by adult worm residing in human’s intestine.
The second infection type occurs with direct contact with animal feces, resulting in the condition known as neurocysticerosis. It is characterized with larval worms infecting the brain and nervous system. This infection is extremely dangerous since it can lead to epilepsy.
Although this type of infection is characteristic to parts in Africa, Asia, and Latin America, the global pork tapeworm distribution is increasing, thus raising the number of new potential patients with this type of infection on a global level.
Although there are some medications which can help you with this infection, still surgery is the most effective way to get rid of it completely. More concerning things are the world food trade and the international travels which increase the risk of consuming infected food.
We need to spread this information to increase the awareness about this problem.
Via Live Science