Nasty Do-Gooders
If you suffer from allergies and can’t seem to get any relief, there maybe some tiny friends who can help.
In the Dark Ages, leeches were commonly used to suck the blood of those afflicted with a variety of illnesses from fatigue, to the common cold. Today, modern medicine has evolved to the point where we no longer need to place critters on our bodies to cure disease. Or have we?
In the English city of Nottingham a research has infected himself with hookworm larvae in an attempt to minimize the effects of allergies and asthma. Doctor Pritchard was acting on a hunch that hookworm larvae may prevent auto-immune responses after he noticed that field workers ion Papua New Guinea who were infected with the Necator americanus hookworm did not suffer from asthma or hay fever. The worms kill people when they are present in high concentrations but the Nottingham doctor used low numbers in himself and later in others, and found no negative effects except for the squeamishness of his patients. Dr Pritchard suggests it is in the worms’ interest to suppress the host’s immune system to help with the worm’s survival. The immune T-cells of the recipients produced less inflammatory chemicals 6 weeks after infection with just 10 hookworms.
A clinic in Mexico now offers the worm inoculation for about $4000 and while this is an unregulated approach at the moment, there is a demand for the treatment. There are some opponents to the treatment that say it is too risky to suppress the immune system in such an imprecise way with a species that could be dangerous. The next step to a testable treatment that could lead to a medication is to isolate the chemical in the worm that has the anti-immune effect. This could take years but could eventually lead to drugs for many difficult to treat auto-immune diseases such as Crohns, arthritis and Lupus.
Other creepy crawlies that are making a comeback include about leeches used to treat abscesses and aid in wound healing, and blowfly larvae maggots that help keep wounds clean by dissolving dead tissue and disinfecting the area. Maggots can be ordered by any physician from an Internet site, and apparently, business is booming.
Liked it
