Post by Awake on Jan 14, 2009 16:29:52 GMT -5
Now, this is a good article l've found. I believe infections from parasites are behind many "vage" diseases which are actually just symptoms like Fibromyalgia and chronic fatigue syndrome...and irritable bowel. This site explains also how parasites release toxins triggering the immune system and leading to autoimmune diseases. I'm not saying parasites are the cause of morgellons, but can be co-infections responsible for the fibro and chronic fatigue.
Article below
The Parasite Epidemic
By Dennis Gersten, M.D.
It's a rather ugly topic. Parasites. Nobody wants to talk about them and few of us do because mainstream medicine has led us to believe that parasites only afflict people living in third-world nations, or those who frequently travel there. The fact is that parasites are quite common and anyone is now susceptible. They can live within us without causing problems, or can create a huge variety of symptoms, including death.
What exactly is a parasite? There are two major categories. Protozoa are tiny, single-celled organisms. Helminths are multi-cellular worms that have a huge range of sizes, from microscopic to many feet long. Direct person-to-person transmission of worms is uncommon, unlike transmission of protozoa.
Protozoa act much like bacteria, traveling through the blood stream to any part of the body. They reproduce without laying eggs and act more like an infection than do the larger parasites, the helminths.
Helminths, or worms, reproduce by laying eggs, which are initially deposited in the gastrointestinal (GI) tract where they stick to the walls of the intestines. The eggs, in turn, hatch, producing larvae, which eventually grow into adult helminths. Helminths have a life cycle consisting of three stages. Some helminths have a fourth stage, namely cysts. Cysts are hardened coverings over thousands of eggs. Protozoa, on the other hand, only have one life form.
Some worms are invasive, moving past the lining of the GI tract into the bloodstream. This group includes Toxoplasma Gondii and Trichinella Spiralis (tapeworm).
A parasite lives off the host. It feeds on you and me, consuming our energy, our nutrients, and our food. Some parasites can live only in the GI tract, while others can settle virtually anywhere in the body. As an example, some that settle in joints gain their nutrition by eating the calcium of our bones. Others live off the myelin sheath that coats each nerve, causing dozens of neuro-cognitive symptoms.
Parasites are hardly rare. While it is extremely difficult to provide precise figures, it is estimated that 80 to 95% of people living in North America has at least one parasite living inside their body. By and large, we become infected by parasites through consumption of contaminated food or water, or by putting anything in the mouth that has come in contact with the stool (feces) of a person or animal infected with a parasite.
Prior to this generation, de-worming was a regular part of life. We should resume this practice, and make parasite testing part of basic health screening.
If you go to a conventional doctor, including a gastroenterologist, if he orders a stool test, the order will read, “Stool for ova and parasites.” A very tiny sample of stool is examined. The sample is checked for blood, and then examined for parasites. This testing is incredibly ineffective.
Rest of the article here: www.lightconnection.us/Archive/jul04_colums.htm
Awake
Article below
The Parasite Epidemic
By Dennis Gersten, M.D.
It's a rather ugly topic. Parasites. Nobody wants to talk about them and few of us do because mainstream medicine has led us to believe that parasites only afflict people living in third-world nations, or those who frequently travel there. The fact is that parasites are quite common and anyone is now susceptible. They can live within us without causing problems, or can create a huge variety of symptoms, including death.
What exactly is a parasite? There are two major categories. Protozoa are tiny, single-celled organisms. Helminths are multi-cellular worms that have a huge range of sizes, from microscopic to many feet long. Direct person-to-person transmission of worms is uncommon, unlike transmission of protozoa.
Protozoa act much like bacteria, traveling through the blood stream to any part of the body. They reproduce without laying eggs and act more like an infection than do the larger parasites, the helminths.
Helminths, or worms, reproduce by laying eggs, which are initially deposited in the gastrointestinal (GI) tract where they stick to the walls of the intestines. The eggs, in turn, hatch, producing larvae, which eventually grow into adult helminths. Helminths have a life cycle consisting of three stages. Some helminths have a fourth stage, namely cysts. Cysts are hardened coverings over thousands of eggs. Protozoa, on the other hand, only have one life form.
Some worms are invasive, moving past the lining of the GI tract into the bloodstream. This group includes Toxoplasma Gondii and Trichinella Spiralis (tapeworm).
A parasite lives off the host. It feeds on you and me, consuming our energy, our nutrients, and our food. Some parasites can live only in the GI tract, while others can settle virtually anywhere in the body. As an example, some that settle in joints gain their nutrition by eating the calcium of our bones. Others live off the myelin sheath that coats each nerve, causing dozens of neuro-cognitive symptoms.
Parasites are hardly rare. While it is extremely difficult to provide precise figures, it is estimated that 80 to 95% of people living in North America has at least one parasite living inside their body. By and large, we become infected by parasites through consumption of contaminated food or water, or by putting anything in the mouth that has come in contact with the stool (feces) of a person or animal infected with a parasite.
Prior to this generation, de-worming was a regular part of life. We should resume this practice, and make parasite testing part of basic health screening.
If you go to a conventional doctor, including a gastroenterologist, if he orders a stool test, the order will read, “Stool for ova and parasites.” A very tiny sample of stool is examined. The sample is checked for blood, and then examined for parasites. This testing is incredibly ineffective.
Rest of the article here: www.lightconnection.us/Archive/jul04_colums.htm
Awake