A New Party Trick to Try

So, we're studying tapeworms in that Infectious Disease class I keep mentioning, and I've just now come to terms with how absolutely terrifying they are.

My professor used to be a physician in Latin America, where tapeworms are prevalent. He tells the story about how one day he had a 30ish year old women come into his clinic. She presented signs of abdominal swelling and pain.

After placing his hand on her abdomen, he felt movement under the skin. His initial thoughts were that the lady was pregnant, but upon further investigation, he found that this wasn't the case.

A stool sample confirmed his suspicions. The woman had tapeworms.

And she was infested.

The type of eggs that were found present in the stool sample were of the Ascaris species. These worms are about the diameter of an earthworm, with the males growing to about 8" long. Females can grow up to 14". (Google image search if you dare)

Fortunately, tapeworms are relatively easy to treat. He gave her the required medicine, and kept her around the clinic.

About half an hour later, she started to vomit, and within the vomit was a worm or two. Then she had diarrhea, and sure enough, a worm or two ended up in the toilet.

Then she vomited again, and about a dozen worms came out. A trip back to the bathroom soon followed with about the same number.

By the end of the half hour the woman was vomiting up worms by the handful. They were trying to escape her system, and were literally crawling up her esophagus to get out, with some exiting through the nose.

When it was all said and done, the lady had expelled over 300 tapeworms. She showed up just in time too. If she had waited any longer the worms could have formed a blockage within her small intestine that would have caused it to rupture, poisoning her system and killing her.

She was cured after that, but I guarantee you she did a much better job with personal and food hygiene from that day on.

Uh, No Thank You

Annnnnnd after spending the past week studying STDs in my "Infectious Diseases" class I now have a better understanding of why God commands monogamy.

Asides from the inability to pee for days yet still manufacturing urine (read "ow"), the development of fibrous growths all over your nether regions, sterility, and some very painful sores, there's also aneurysms, blindness, cardiovascular disease, links to Alzheimer's, and more.

Don't be stupid. God doesn't want his children playing in the street.

Me Punch HARD!!!

That feeling you get after you've spent days collecting research for a paper on anthrax, and have finally come up with enough information for a well-rounded paper, only to find that your professor decided to get creative with the instructions and is making you compare and critique articles instead.

And as a result, most of your research was for nothing.