gummy worms across the pond.....

[Herodotus]

just saw they're about to test this in the UK.

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guess we'll see if there's anything to this. i'll bet no one gets PML from this study. if it works, how could they ever justify the $$$$$$$$$$ charged 4 all the other treatments for............worm eggs?!


cheers,

H.

[SalpalSally]

EeEeEuUuUuU, pahleeze!!!

Once the larvae come into contact with the skin they work their way through into the blood stream until they reach the lungs where they are coughed up and swallowed to get to their final destination, the gut, where they survive by latching on to the gut lining and feeding on the host's blood. The worms do not multiply in the host but reproduce by producing fertile eggs, which are expelled in faecal matter. These hatch into infective larvae outside the body, and are used to infect patients.

[agate]

I see some funds have been allocated for this research. I trust that the participants will be paid--handsomely.

Somehow I can't get into the spirit of this particular study.

[Virginia]

This one is kind of hard to get too excited about, although it seems like I remember something about something similar to this coming up quite awhile back.
Don't think I could bring myself to be one of the early volunteers. Some others will have to pave the way for me on this.

[Herodotus]

ha ha virginia - we don't have to worry - the brave brits are doing this, and since they love blood pudding, worms don't seem a far stretch. i thought nuthatch might jump on this, but those birds don't eat worms. per wickipedia: "Nuthatches are omnivorous, eating mostly insects, nuts and seeds". if omnivorous, that means twinkies and ding-dongs, too, but no worms. i'm omnivorous myself. lets hope the trials go well, then the next step is to prevent big pharma from deep sixing such a cheap treatment, that doesn't even come w/a "wait, there's more!" possible brain infection. (which med, tysabri, i'm scheduled to begin)

here's to our friends the brits,
H.

[nuthatch]

I'll pass on this one too! But I do LOVE twinkies and ding dongs!:o

[Lyon]

No getting around the fact that it's gross but it's interesting that it's based on the thought that the loss of helminth parasites in humans might be what led to these modern inflammatory diseases which popped up in the same populations in the same places and times as our improved living conditions no longer allowed the helminths to complete their life cycle.

It's just fact that places which don't have electricity and flush toilets do have helminth parasites and don't have MS and places which do have electricity and flush toilets do have MS and it's starting to seem that there isn't as much of a genetic component as once thought because as non whites increasingly get electricity and flush toilets, they are increasingly getting MS.

[SalpalSally]

Hmmmmmmmmm Lyon.. Very interesting..

[agate]

It's just fact that places which don't have electricity and flush toilets do have helminth parasites and don't have MS and places which do have electricity and flush toilets do have MS and it's starting to seem that there isn't as much of a genetic component as once thought because as non whites increasingly get electricity and flush toilets, they are increasingly getting MS.

Maybe I just don't want to believe in this worm idea, but if you're going to reason in this way, you might also want to think about how countries without electricity or modern plumbing are also countries whose people are usually too poor to afford to go to doctors very often--and so they may have MS all their lives but never be aware of it.

It wouldn't be diagnosed without a doctor to diagnose it, would it? Autopsies aren't done routinely on everybody, and so autopsy findings showing MS would give only a partial picture of the extent of MS in a country's population.

[MaryLiz]

20 years ago, I lived in South America out in the countryside without a flush toilet and limited running water. And for the last 12 years have as part of my work visited many places where the "facilities" were just as primitive. 10 years after my little country hut, I come up with my first "attack".

Agate is right about no one having the money or wherewithal to see a doctor if they have symptoms. Or they see someone and that person doesn't have a clue so they give the patient some vitamin shots and that's it.

This is such an interesting and complicated disease---just wish I wasn't interested because of its effect on me.

[Lyon]

This is such an interesting and complicated disease---just wish I wasn't interested because of its effect on me.

lol, isn't that the truth! In our case my wife has MS, I don't although I was interested in the hygiene hypothesis years before my wife was diagnosed, or we even suspected that she has MS.

My point is that although life with parasites is a terribly gross thing to think about, the saying "cleanliness is next to Godliness" was coined specifically with the effort to eliminate germs and parasites in mind, yet if it turns out that our loss of those germs and parasites gave rise to auto-immunity/inflammatory diseases, how ironic would that be?

You make a good point. Without a doubt even here in America there are a percentage of MS cases that are missed. No one knows what percentage. A big question in MS has always been "why doesn't everyone who meets the genetic predispositions and environmental criteria get MS?" and I don't think it's beyond consideration to think that maybe everyone in those situations does have MS but for whatever reason the MS process never reaches the point of causing problems in most people, which is an entirely different way at looking at things and obviously different ways of looking at things are needed and looking at it that way seems to make the quirks of MS easier to understand.

[Lyon]

20 years ago, I lived in South America out in the countryside without a flush toilet and limited running water. And for the last 12 years have as part of my work visited many places where the "facilities" were just as primitive. 10 years after my little country hut, I come up with my first "attack".

I'm not trying to "sell" the hygiene hypothesis because we should all follow our own interests but in response I should say that, what in my mind, seems to give the hygiene hypothesis some added veracity is that it was developed with only asthma and allergies in mind. At that time autoimmune diseases were thought to be almost an opposite process so researchers trying to meet some preconceived notion regarding autoimmunes is beyond consideration.

With that in mind it's interesting that the research of the early hygiene hypothesis researchers pointed to necessary exposure to germs and parasites before puberty (they figured 14 years old) in order to train or "educate" the human immune system to behave appropriately through the rest of life. To me that's always almost seemed to read that exposure to germs and parasites after the age of 14 was not only unnecessary but unhelpful, which also seems to hint that if you didn't receive the necessary exposure before the age of 14, exposure after the age of 14 is too late.

A little off topic but it's interesting that MS researchers independently came to notice that someone raised past the age of 14 in a low MS incidence area and migrated to a high MS incidence area retained their low level of incidence while someone raised past the age of 14 in a high MS incidence area moving to a low MS incidence area retained their higher rate of likelihood of getting MS at some point in the future. Is that due to exposure to germs and parasites and lack thereof? Impossible to know at this point but an interesting consideration.


Both you and Agate hint that medical care, and thereby MS records in third world countries is lacking and that is true and in light that MS cases go unnoticed in America that must also be the case in third world countries.

On the other hand, no longer is anyplace truly isolated. I think most people would be truly amazed at how many researchers from the developed world are in third world countries observing and asking questions and MS symptoms would not go unnoticed in those conditions when someone with progressive MS would either have to be supported or die. I've never heard it stated that MS is unknown in third world countries but instead is terribly rare and it seems there is every reason to believe that.

Supporting that is the fact that there were doctors and good communication in England and America prior to the 20th century and the doctors were at least capable of observing and documenting what we now consider MS symptoms and while there have been occasional cases from earliest times the records show that it was MUCH more rare. In the 20th century in America and England MS had been defined and doctors were aware of it and medical help was unquestionably available and documentation excellent and that showed that MS incidence was becoming less and less rare and incidence increasing at alarming rates.

In recent years I've become friends with Dr Kurtzke and his studies of MS incidence in the Faroe Islands are a really good learning experience because those people were/are Northern European with good medical help and documentation but isolated so were behind the times regarding what we might consider their being "developed" and MS was literally unknown there until they were thrust together with the English Navy and subsequently MS ran rampant.

It's literally beyond question that MS was rare and continues to be rare in some populations and affects people at much higher rates in other populations, often despite genetic similarities.

[agate]

Lyon, when I said:

Maybe I just don't want to believe in this worm idea, but if you're going to reason in this way, you might also want to think about how countries without electricity or modern plumbing are also countries whose people are usually too poor to afford to go to doctors very often--and so they may have MS all their lives but never be aware of it.

I had in mind people who might have foot drop, bladder incontinence, blurry vision--the kinds of symptoms many people can ignore for a lifetime--not the people with more severely disabling cases of MS.

There are many people with a lot of MS symptoms but they're not so incapacitated that they're driven to seek medical attention, especially in countries where medical attention isn't so easy to come by. These are the cases that would go undiagnosed in those countries, IMO.

A person with foot drop who goes through life saying "I have this gimpy leg" or the person with blurry vision who says "My eyesight isn't always good" can bumble along indefinitely--but still have MS. It just hasn't been found.

[Lyon]

Lyon, when I said:
I had in mind people who might have foot drop, bladder incontinence, blurry vision--the kinds of symptoms many people can ignore for a lifetime--not the people with more severely disabling cases of MS.

Sounds like I came on a little strong, sorry.

[agate]

Lyon, no need to apologize.

You do seem to have opened up a whole new can of worms here.