Hold onto your stomachs!

On the back of George from Aberdeenshire‘s question in Episode 60, regarding bugs which use the human skin much as a mole treats a village cricket pitch, Charlie has written in with the following nightmare-inducer:

I think they were thinking of the bot fly, which does indeed lay its eggs under animal skin (can be human) and then when the larvae hatch they pop out of your skin. This has happened to someone I know when in Africa, but I think they are indigenous to quite a few countries. Pretty rank! To treat them you supposedly cover the eggy skin areas with Vaseline to suffocate/kill the eggs/larvae, although this may be an old wives’ tale. Nice.

There are also lots of nasty wormy type things, generally found in Africa, that infect humans as part of their life cycle, and that you can sometimes see under the skin e.g. guinea worm, or wiggling across the front of the eye e.g. loa loa filariasis. Mmmm. Not sure about the worm that would jump out of the loo and up your urethra though…!

It’s not a worm, Charlie, it’s a fish! In fact Gene wrote in to identify it as the candiru fish; apparently its urine-ascending powers are mere rumour, but as a precaution you might as well take a tea-strainer with you the next time you need to piss in the Amazon.

Subscribe with iTunes • Listen to previous episodes • Question Archive
FAQ • Facebook Fanclub • Merchandise Superstore • YouTube Channel

This entry was posted on July 2, 2008 at 8:54 pm and is filed under Answer Us Back! Your time to opine. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.