5 ms·
I couldn't find much information about the treatment details. Do you know if anyone has looked into sterilizing the worms? It seems like the only downside is
by tocomment 13y ago
I couldn't find much information about the treatment details. Do you know if anyone has looked into sterilizing the worms?
It seems like the only downside is worrying about the worms reproducing. If you could make them sterile before applying them, and then just take new ones every month or so.
- refurb 13y agoThey don't need to sterilize the worms, they just use worms that can't reproduce in humans (i.e. pig whipworms) I'm keeping an eye out for the trial results. If it works, it would greatly expand our understanding of immune diseases. http://biotechtranslated.com/2011/07/30/the-hygiene-hypothesis-goes-on-trial/ http://biotechtranslated.com/2011/07/30/the-hygiene-hypothes...
- tocomment 13y agoI didn't realize that. That's pretty smart. Do you know if you still get weight loss with pig whipworms? I've always thought worms would be preferable to surgery for obesity too.
- refurb 13y agoAs far as I know the whipworm infection is over relatively quickly. Usually the weight loss you see with parasite infections is due to prolonged illness.
- ef4 13y agoEven some worms that are specialized for humans can't complete their entire lifecycle in the gut. The mature worms produce eggs in the gut, but the eggs will only hatch in the soil. The larval stage stays in the ground, and then the young worms infect another person through the skin. People who deliberately want to maintain an infection need to actually poop onto some soil, then come back later and walk on it.