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Letter: Diet of worms

Published 15 May 2004

From Matthew Smart

Reading your article on a diet of worms to help prevent bowel disease (10 April, p 8), one cannot help but think of the consequences of feeding people parasites. Worm eggs would be discharged in sewage, and where raw sewage is piped into rivers and the water used for irrigation the ova would end up on pastures and could infect livestock.

People could also be infected if they drink or swim in water contaminated with Trichuris suis ova. This to me sounds like an unnecessary risk, even if the worms do not survive long in people.

Cambridge, UK

Issue no. 2447 published 15 May 2004

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