Eat Worms - Feel Better

“http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/3287733.stm

Eat worms - feel better

Who would deliberately drink a dose of gut worms? The answer is Anna Glanz, an ordinary mother-of-two from Iowa.

She's testing the remarkable theory that not all parasites are necessarily bad for us. Some of them may actually help us fight diseases.

A BBC documentary looks at how some parasites are so well-adapted to using humans as hosts, that when you take them away, there are unexpected results.

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Every three weeks Anna goes to Dr Weinstock's clinic and takes a drink full of worm eggs.
A gutful of parasites might help ease symptoms

But Anna reckons it is worth it: "I don't really think of them as being alive I guess, it's almost just like taking a pill or something.

"I try not to think of them as disgusting or anything like that. And I couldn't live the way I was living. I was desperate to try anything. I just wanted to get well".

The worms grow inside her gut and then pass out after a few weeks, but as a result of having these worms in her gut, her ulcerative colitis is in remission - she doesn't suffer from any of the symptoms any more.

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"People have what I consider an irrational fear of worms. Nobody wants to go to the toilet and look into the toilet and see something wiggle".

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Another person feeling the benefit of a worm infestation is academic researcher Alan Brown, who picked up hookworms while on a field-trip outside the UK.

The worm hangs around damp earth or water droplets, and on contact with skin burrows through and heads for the gut.

There it attaches itself to the wall - and drinks blood to live.

However, in western countries, where people are well-nourished, a moderate infestation is likely to have no nasty side-effects at all.

Dr Brown examines his own faeces under the microscope to try to gauge how many worms currently reside within him.

"Given the number of eggs there, there's about 300 hookworms in my guts."

However, there's a useful effect - his hayfever has virtually disappeared, and now he is working on the powers of the hookworm with a view to developing an asthma drug.”

“EWWWWWWWWWWW”

“Same here, PASSSSSSSSS!

Iffin ya want gut worms, just drink the water at Isle Royal..BLECH!!!”

“After having to de-worm my dog when she was a puppy, this just seems nasty.”

“Are you a real doctor?”

“No”

“No, but he plays one on TT.”

“Hmmmm, they're always from Iowa or Arkansas, aren't they??”