Posts Tagged ‘Hookworm’

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No more restless legs!

Tuesday, August 17th, 2010

Restless Leg Syndrome (aka ‘Ekbom’s Syndrome’) was a problem for me for many years.

Having M.E./Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, I desperately needed all the rest I could get and relied on a good sleep at night and two lengthy periods of deep relaxation/meditation during my waking hours in order to get through the day without feeling too dreadful.

But, as my health steadily declined, I began to develop a tendency to become uncontrollably restless just as I was going to sleep, and also after I’d been meditating for 10 or 15 minutes, a situation that threatened to scupper the energetic equilibrium that I was already having to work so hard to maintain.

I reported the problem – which mostly affected my right leg – to my GP, but he didn’t recognise any specific condition and could only suggest that I take sleeping tablets to knock me out at night, and prescribed an …azepam drug, which was fine for one night, but, if I took it for more than two nights, it actually made the problem worse.

When I returned to see the doctor, after doing some homework, I was able to give him detailed information about Restless Leg Syndrome, which was clearly the problem I was experiencing. He admitted that he had not heard of this, but he was willing to learn and, together, we explored several therapeutic approaches. Unfortunately, none proved successful.

I then tried electroacupuncture – again unsuccessfully – and sought, but could not find, an osteopath familiar with the use of the Dalrymple pump technique, which I had heard might help.

The usual nutritional approaches – taking magnesium, calcium and potassium, and avoiding caffeine – didn’t work either, nor did vitamin E or a strong B complex formulation, nor even drinking tonic water (for the quinine). And, as the problem got worse, I began to find that drugs taken for other conditions, such as metoclopramide to treat gastroparesis, could dramatically worsen the symptoms.

It was at this point that I first encountered hookworm, a development that was eventually to transform my health in many ways.

So many of my multifarious symptoms disappeared or were significantly reduced after getting ‘hooked’ that I was overcome by all the remarkable improvements I was enjoying, and didn’t immediately notice the actual moment of cessation of several of these, my restless legs included.

I was looking at a list of autoimmune diseases when I happened to notice that RLS was among the 150-plus diseases included, and the realisation suddenly dawned that this – one of ‘my conditions’ – was no longer a problem for me. I was almost as shocked to acknowledge that I hadn’t noticed its passing as I was relieved that it was finally gone.

I immediately looked up the record I had begun after getting my hookworm, and found that references to RLS began to reduce rapidly from the fifth week post inoculation. There was no record at all of restlessness from weeks 6 to 10, only a few mild episodes between weeks 10 and 19, and then absolutely nothing from then onwards!

It’s now 18 months since I adopted my treasured harem of hookies, and there has been no sign at all of any restlessness in my legs since week 19, a fact about which I am even more relieved, having just read that, in the absence of other effective medical options, doctors have recently begun to use the drug Qualaquin to treat RLS.

Qualaquin is approved for the treatment of a type of malaria, not RLS, and it has the potential to adversely affect almost every body system. The list of its effects includes permanent kidney damage, deafness, blindness, cardiovascular problems, severe nose bleeds, dizziness, nausea, vomiting and diarrhea. The FDA have already released a statement alerting consumers to these dangers, after receiving a slew of reports of side effects including serious and life-threatening reactions.

My hookworm initially caused some temporary gastric symptoms, particularly diarrhoea, but the small number I have will never cause any worse effect than this, so I’m hugely relieved that I discovered them before my GP got round to suggesting I try Qualaquin!

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Hookworm spared by new nerve block technique

Monday, August 9th, 2010

A friend and fellow hookworm host recently fell and tore the muscles off the bones in his shoulder. Surgery was the only option as the muscles needed to be stapled back onto the bone, but he was concerned about the welfare of his recently acquired hookworm!

Fortunately, the surgical team (at a hospital in Nottingham, UK) were equipped to use a new nerve block technique to numb his whole arm.

My friend was completely fascinated by the whole experience, from the anaesthetist commenting that it was a good thing they were using ultrasound to guide the injection because the nerves in his shoulder were not where they should have been, to hearing, but not feeling, the staples driving into his shoulder.

Best of all, was the fact that the hookworm-induced diarrhoea that he had been experiencing before the operation, continued after it, confirming that the anaesthetic had not put paid to the little guys in his gut. Had he had a general anaesthetic, the nitrous oxide would have killed them outright.

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Adopt a symbiont and gain beneficial genes

Monday, July 26th, 2010

Conventional wisdom tells us that animals are able to adapt genetically in ways that help them survive and reproduce, but there may be another way to gain an evolutionary advantage – adoption of a symbiont.

Scientists have recently revealed a good example of this phenomenon, which is a much quicker way for an animal to acquire a new defence than having to laboriously mutate its own genes over many generations.

A type of bacterium called Spiroplasma has been found to provide black flies with an effective defence against a parasite that impairs their reproduction, an advantage that is also passed naturally from mother to offspring.

The researchers suggest that this phenomenon may actually be common and that it may have been occurring undetected in many different organisms for ages. It could also, they propose, be employed to help control parasitic worms in humans to prevent such diseases as river blindness and elephantiasis.

Perhaps bacteria could also be used to control, rather than eradicate hookworm in those populations that are over-burdened by these organisms. This approach would obviate an unrecognised disadvantage of hookworm vaccines that arises from their removal of recipients’ ability to host hookworm in the long term, which potentially may set the stage for the development of allergy and autoimmune disease (as a result of the loss of the hookworm’s antiinflammatory benefits) and simultaneously deprive recipients of the opportunity to relieve these conditions by means of helminthic therapy.

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New worm whips colitis into shape

Sunday, June 13th, 2010

For some time, the small intestine-dwelling hookworm, Necator americanus has proved remarkably effective in the treatment of Crohn’s disease, without any long-term side effects. However, people with ulcerative colitis have found hookworm to be less effective in treating this disease than it is for other autoimmune diseases. Fortunately, reports are now starting to appear of just how effective the colon-dwelling whipworm, Trichuris trichiura, is against colitis.

Some people are using the eggs of the pig whipworm, Trichuris suis, to treat colitis but, as this organism only survives in humans for a couple of weeks, regular dosing is required, and the cost of this continued treatment is considerable. By comparison, the human whipworm survives in humans for approximately two years, representing much greater convenience and much lower cost.

The only side effects of human whipworm treatment are very minor, temporary symptoms in the first few weeks after taking a dose of the eggs (in a drink), and there are no long-term adverse effects, which puts this treatment in an entirely different league from the current therapies offered by mainstream medicine in the form of pharmaceutical drugs, the majority of which carry serious risks from long-term use, and some of which may prove fatal.

Both hookworm and whipworm can be obtained, for self-administration, from Autoimmune Therapies.

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Fifteen months of relief from food intolerance and fatigue

Sunday, May 30th, 2010

It’s now 15 months since I acquired a team of 35 hookworm to keep my errant immune system in check, and I’m still over the moon with the results – very much enjoying having more energy and being able to eat many normal foods again.

After having had my original cohort of hookworm for six months, I added whipworm and have recently also taken on board another 10 hookworm, in pursuit of hopefully even greater benefits, though it’s too early yet to be sure exactly what, if any help these additions will produce.

At the moment, I’m very much enjoying my new diet. I’ve recently started to make my own kefir (more ‘old friends’ but, this time, of the bacterial variety!) and I’m also eating more food raw, after finding that my gut feels even more comfortable on a raw food diet. Most of my diet is now normal food, and I never eat more than 30 per cent of the special semi-elemental feed that had for so long been my sole sustenance.

On the strength of my experience so far, others with similar problems are beginning to take the plunge and get ‘hooked’ themselves. A very good friend who has the same extreme degree of food intolerance – as well as MS and M.E. (CFIDS) – recently inoculated with hookworm and, after a rather rough ride with the temporary gastric symptoms that can occur in the first few weeks after inoculation with this species, is already feeling better than she has for many years and is just now starting to eat normal foods again.

What has amazed me, when she and I have compared notes, is how uncannily similar her progress has been to my own, with milestones being passed in the same sequence, and at very close to the same timing.

I began to experience a sense of well-being for the first time at about 30 days post inoculation with hookworm, my friend at 43 days. I began suddenly and unexpectedly to take an interest in cooking smells for the first time in many years at day 39, and she observed herself responding unusually positively to seeing food on the TV at 47 days. I experienced real hunger for the first time at 43 days, and she reported feeling the first pangs of hunger at 60 days – and now describes herself as ‘ravenous’! It’s the same pattern, just delayed by a couple of weeks in her case, and she’s recently also said that her temperature control has been a lot better since week 6, and that she’s now needing a lot less sleep, which, again, mirrors my own experience.

I find all of this truly amazing. My own story could easily have been just a one-off case, but add my friend’s almost identical experience, and the whole thing becomes so much more significant.

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Boston trial of TSO for allergies

Thursday, May 27th, 2010

Doctors at two Boston hospitals are seeking patients with food allergies – particularly those with a moderately serious peanut allergy – to take part in a clinical trial to assess the therapeutic value of ingesting the eggs of the pig whipworm, Trichuris suis (TSO).

The eggs, which are microscopic, have no discernible smell or taste and are invisible to the naked eye, are taken in a drink every other week.

The researchers believe that this treatment has the potential to change the lives of millions of allergy sufferers, no matter what type of allergy they have.

This is one of a number of trials taking place around the world to gauge the effects of replacing some of the parasites that we in the Western world have lost in recent times, due to lifestyle changes.

The reintroduction of some of these lost microorganisms, by means of Helminthic Therapy, has already proved to be of great benefit in ameliorating allergy and anaphylaxis and suitable organisms can already be purchased privately by individuals – TSO from Ovamed (five year cost approximately $55,000.00) and the human hookworm, Necator americanus (which produces the same beneficial effects in cases of allergy, yet costs only $2,900.00 over five years) from Autoimmune Therapies.

One particular question that the researchers of the Boston study hope to answer is exactly how long people would have to ingest regular doses of TSO to keep food allergies at bay. The need for this particular regimen is, however, peculiar to treatment with TSO. The human whipworm, Trichuris trichiura only needs to be taken every two years, and the human hookworm, Necator americanus, every five years. For further discussion on the selection of helminths, see Return of the Lost Worms.

Anyone interested in joining the Boston study should contact Marie-Helene Jouvin at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (617-667-2816)

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Worm-based meds for rheumatoid arthritis?

Sunday, May 9th, 2010

This article reports the claim by Scottish scientists that secretions from the filarial nematode, Acanthocheilonema viteae (a parasitic worm) could be used, within five years, to treat conditions such as rheumatoid arthritis and asthma.

Prompted by two decades of observations that these and other inflammatory conditions are less common in Third World countries, where intestinal worms are still endemic, researchers have discovered that the worm-derived molecule, ES-62, appears to prevent symptoms in mice by disrupting production of the pro-inflammatory cytokines released by mast cells.

The researchers, who are the first to describe a pathogen-derived molecule capable of directly inhibiting mast cell effector function, aim to produce a synthetic form of ES-62 which they believe could be used to develop new drugs to combat rheumatoid arthritis and, ultimately, other types of autoimmune disease.

This will be welcome news to the many people whose arthritis is only poorly controlled by currently available medications, However, apart from having to wait for several more years for the new treatment, this will be based on only one of the many (probably synergistic) molecules that parasitic worms produce, Moreover, in its synthetic form, the molecule may prove to be no less a cause of adverse side effects in humans than are most of the drugs available today.

While these and other scientists around the world are straining every sinew to wrest from our parasitic companions the secrets of their chemical wizardry, a simple and elegant solution already exists to the problem of autoimmunity, in the form of safe, tiny, live intestinal worms, small numbers of which can be replaced in the gut without causing any long-term side effects.

The human hookworm, Necator americanus (available from Autoimmune Therapies), will deliver to its host a constant supply of anti-inflammatory molecules to which humans have become perfectly adapted over millions of years. As Necator lives for approximately five years, its presence avoids the need to remember to take daily medications and obviates the problems associated with synthetic pharmaceuticals, which are invariably formulated with additional binders, fillers, excipients and various other substances to which a significant number of people experience adverse reactions.

Related article:

Worm-derived proteins effective against colitis

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Hookworm vaccine: double-edged sword

Friday, April 30th, 2010

Reading the information on the development of the hookworm vaccine may fill most readers with the warm glow that comes from the belief that yet another medical milestone is about to be passed en route to a disease-free world. My own response, however, is one of absolute horror!

Once this vaccine is available, it will certainly have the potential to reduce the anaemia and protein malnutrition suffered by more than a half-billion people worldwide who are infected with hookworm but, assuming that it is effective, it will totally wipe out the worm burdens of all those individuals who receive it. And, if it is effective, long-term, these people may never again be able to host hookworm, and therein lies a very significant problem.

There is a clear link between a lack of intestinal worms and many of the worst diseases of modern Western civilization – devastating autoimmune diseases such as multiple sclerosis, Crohn’s disease and ulcerative colitis, as well as allergies, some of which can kill in a few moments via anaphylaxis. And there is also growing evidence that replacing a controlled number of intestinal worms, such as hookworm, can effectively treat these same diseases.

The difference between disease causation and disease remediation is numbers. Many hundreds of worms will cause problems, and the more there are, the bigger these problems will be. However, less than a hundred worms will not cause any health problems, but will provide effective protection against inflammation, allergy and autoimmune disease.

Surely, it would be far more sensible to seek better ways to control the numbers of hookworm being hosted by individuals rather than wipe then out completely. But this kind of thinking is anathema to medical authorities around the world, who are now hell-bent on getting rid of what they can only perceive as a threat.

Not surprisingly, the authorities are being eagerly encouraged in this endeavour by the pharmaceutical multinationals who have realised that vaccines offer them the opportunity to sell drugs not only to the sick, but also to the well. Hence the huge increase in the number of vaccines currently being developed and pressed upon a largely unsuspecting public.

Where all this madness will end is anyone’s guess, but treating hookworm infections using vaccines will likely result in millions of people developing autoimmune diseases, which they will not be able to treat using controlled numbers of hookworm because they have been vaccinated against this organism.

Had I been given this vaccine, I would not have been able to experience the relief from my allergies, chronic fatigue, and Crohn’s disease that the acquisition of a few hookworm has produced. So, from my perspective, the deployment of a hookworm vaccine has the potential to create a nightmare scenario. The only positive side to the development will be the inevitable financial rewards for those who happen to work for, or have shares in the company that manufactures the vaccine!

Quite apart from the above considerations, there are also many question marks hanging over the safety of vaccines in general. These products are a veritable witch’s brew of toxic elements, and medical professionals are continually revealing confronting statistics showing the darker reality of what vaccines may actually do to those who receive them.

Unfortunately, so far as the hookworm vaccine is concerned, the commercial momentum is probably now unstoppable. The only hope for the unsuspecting millions who will be given this vaccine is that it will prove less effective in the long term, in the same way that the mumps vaccine has proven to be ineffective, with protection levels falling off very quickly after administration. I certainly hope that this will be the case!

Related article:

Swine flu vaccine: do you really want it?

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Autoimmune & biotherapy news 9/4/10

Friday, April 9th, 2010

Insulin-producing beta cells can be ‘reborn’. This article outlines groundbreaking research showing that pancreatic alpha cells are capable of changing naturally and spontaneously into insulin-producing beta cells.

After creating an artificial form of type 1 diabetes in mice by destroying 99% of their beta cells, and then giving them insulin therapy to keep them alive, the scientists observed alpha cells spontaneously change into functioning beta cells, a process which continued until enough alpha cells had converted into beta cells to allow cessation of insulin therapy.

Even if such a process occurs, or could be induced, in humans, the immune assault which kills the beta cells would arguably continue to attack any reprogrammed cells, which is why people who have had transplants of insulin-producing cells must eventually return to using insulin.

Although the article doesn’t mention the possibility, one can’t help wondering whether an appropriate dose of helminths might successfully control the autoimmune response and preserve the new beta cells.

‘I was stung by 1,500 bees and I feel great.’ This article reports on the ‘tremendous relief’ experienced by an MS sufferer who was bedridden before trying Bee Venom Therapy (Apitherapy) in which she received 1,500 bee stings to specific sites on her back over 18 months. She is now reportedly ‘back on her feet’, with a much improved quality of life.

There are two types of MS, study reveals. This piece outlines new findings that may revolutionise the diagnosis and treatment of MS and give significant hope to sufferers. It appears that there are two types of MS, determined according to whether a patient has Th1 or Th17 immune responses, and that a simple blood test may be able to differentiate between the two. 

The study also showed that only one type of MS responds to beta interferon – generally considered the best conventional treatment – and that the second type may actually be made worse by this treatment. 

UV light may benefit MS, beyond vitamin D. Whilst it has been known for three decades that MS is much more common in higher latitudes than in the tropics, and that vitamin D may reduce MS symptoms, new research suggests that the ultraviolet portion of sunlight could play an even more important role than vitamin D in preventing and/or controlling MS.

Bacterium may be new anthelminthic. A toxin produced by the soil bacterium Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt) could potentially become a treatment for roundworm infection.

Used as a pesticide for decades by organic farmers, this bacterial protein has also been found to kill intestinal parasitic roundworms in mice and may become a treatment option for humans, perhaps replacing albendazole, the current World Health Organization-approved treatment, to which hookworm and some other parasitic nematodes have shown signs of resistance.

As someone who is hosting hookworm as a therapy, this article gives me some cause for concern, as it mentions that some plants have been genetically modified with Bt genes since 1996 so that crops such as corn and potato can themselves produce the crystal protein, providing protection from insects without the use of pesticides. What concerns me is whether eating these GM foods might have an adverse effect on my highly prized team of gut buddies.

Infection with tick-borne parasite may suppress malaria. This new study suggests that monkeys chronically infected with babesia, a tick-borne parasite, are able to suppress malaria infection when exposed to a simian malaria parasite.

Can evolution explain the rise in certain diseases? This article calls for the adoption by physicians of an evolutionary perspective on health and disease instead of the traditional, Newtonian view of the human body as a perfectly designed machine.

Evolutionary concepts have already helped to explain why some diseases are so prevalent and difficult to prevent: the elimination from our lives of bacteria and worms has resulted in more allergies, asthma and autoimmune diseases, and our lack of adaptation to new risk factors in modern society, such as tobacco, alcohol, a high-fat diet and contraceptives has resulted in higher rates of cancer.

Further insights may help to explain why disease is generally so prevalent and difficult to prevent – perhaps because natural selection favors reproduction over health, biology evolves more slowly than culture, and pathogens evolve more quickly than humans.

Acne drug/ulcerative colitis link again demonstrated. New evidence has been found of a cause-and-effect relationship between the acne drug isotretinoin (Accutane) and ulcerative colitis – though not Crohn’s disease – which suggests that patients on the medication are four times more likely than non-users to develop colitis within a year. The risk of developing this disease appears to climb in tandem with a patient’s daily dose of the drug.

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Crohn’s disease treatment update

Tuesday, February 9th, 2010

The treatment of Crohn’s disease usually involves the use of anti-inflammatory drugs, but these are frequently only partially effective and are also associated with serious side effects. Many patients eventually require surgery in spite of the use of these medicines.

The serious risks associated with Crohn’s medications have again been highlighted recently by a study which found that the immunosuppressant thiopurine drugs – one of the cornerstones of Crohn’s treatment – can increase the risk of cancers linked to viral infections.

Patients receiving thiopurines – such as azathioprine and Imuran – were found to have a more than five-fold increase in the risk of lymphoma compared with those who had never received these drugs. Older male patients with a longer history of inflammatory bowel disease also have an increased risk of lymphoma.

Another recent study indicated that patients with inflammatory bowel disease, especially those receiving thiopurine medications, may also be at increased risk of developing non-melanoma skin cancers.

Only in the last few days, a new warning has been issued about the drug Tysabri (Natalizumab), the multiple sclerosis medication that was approved for use in moderate to severe Crohn’s disease in early 2008.

Tysabri, which had previously been linked with a rare but deadly brain disease called progressive multifocal leukoencephalopathy (PML), has now been confirmed to increase the risk of this disease. Whilst there have been no reports of PML in patients taking Tysabri for less than 12 months, the rate in patients who use the drug for two to three years is estimated to be one case per 1,000 patients.

The search for a better treatment alternative continues with a new multi-centre trial, funded to the tune of $4.7 million, which is about to compare the use of the conventional management strategy featuring gradual escalation of drug therapy with a newer approach combining immunosuppression with a tumor necrosis factor alpha blocking drug and an anti-metabolite.

Turning to studies that are already bearing fruit, potential sources of relief for Crohn’s are being revealed by research looking at the effects of certain nutrients on the activity of this disease. For example, it appears that it may be advantageous for Crohn’s patients to vary the types of fat that they consume, especially to increase the amount of Omega-3 fatty acids and decrease the Omega-6 fats that are now found in extremely high quantities in the average Western diet.

Several studies have suggested that Omega-3 fats – available from oily fish, and fish oil supplements – exert a protective effect by modulating intestinal inflammation, and a new study has found that a high intake of total, saturated and monounsaturated fats, and a higher ratio of Omega-6 to Omega-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids, is associated with higher disease activity.

Another new study has identified a further novel treatment avenue for people with Crohn’s or other inflammatory bowel diseases, in the readily available vitamin D. The study shows, for the first time, that vitamin D deficiency can contribute to Crohn’s disease, and that supplementing with this nutrient can counter the effects of the disease.

Vitamin D impacts the immune system, specifically the innate immune system that acts as the body’s first defense against microbial invaders, and it appears that the inflammatory response, which is thought to underlie autoimmune conditions, is probably the result of a defect in the handling of intestinal bacteria by the innate immune system.

Another potentially hopeful recent study, has found that two compounds extracted from cannabis – the cannabinoids THC and cannabidiol – appear to be able to restore the gut membrane barrier by allowing epithelial cells to form tighter bonds.

Studies being carried out at Nottingham into the use of live hookworm as a therapeutic agent in Crohn’s and other autoimmune diseases is still a very long way from demonstrating efficacy, mainly due to the low numbers of worms having been used in these trials to date, and the inadequately short period that the worms have been left in place.

Nevertheless, existing research, already suggests a high degree of success from the use of hookworm, and the efficacy of this treatment is regularly confirmed by patients who have chosen not to wait for further trials, and have obtained a supply of helminths elsewhere.

Helminthic therapy is therefore arguably the current treatment of choice for Crohn’s disease, especially as it provides freedom from the long-term side effects associated with so many of the available drug treatments. Unfortunately, the FDA has recently banned the supply of helminths to anyone within the US, so American citizens who are too ill to travel are now effectively denied access to this treatment, which is available everywhere else in the world, via the internet, from Autoimmune Therapies.

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The erosion of choice in healthcare

Thursday, January 14th, 2010

Those who frequent the Yahoo Helminthic Therapy forum will know that, in early November, 2009, the US Food and Drug Administrtation moved against Autoimmune Therapies, the company that supplies therapeutic doses of hookworm and whipworm to individuals who wish to use these organisms as a treatment for allergy and autoimmune disorders.

By declaring these natural ‘probiotics’ to be pharmaceuticals, the FDA effectively ended AIT’s production and shipping of helminths from within the US but, with no other company anywhere in the world able to supply these particular organisms to the scores of very sick individuals who need them, Jasper Lawrence and his colleagues were determined to continue to meet their obligations to customers, so Jasper was left with no option but to abandon his home, and leave family and friends in order to relocate in haste to another country.

Shortly after this event, I heard of two somewhat similar cases in which small companies selling completely natural products have been prosecuted by government agencies.

A small US farmer selling unadulterated, raw milk – as drunk by humans since animals were first domesticated – was prosecuted after a sting operation by a local Health Department, and a small UK firm selling a sleep-aid made solely from common grasses was prosecuted by local Trading Standards officials in Wales.

Unfortunately, these are not isolated incidents, but just further examples of the steady – one might even say stealthy – erosion of the choices available to individuals who prefer alternative or natural approaches to healthcare. And, sadly, the vast majority of citizens in the US and Europe are blissfully unaware of what is taking place.

Those who are not already aware of the situation will find enlightenment in these two blogs by Jon Barron – Alternative Health – Now You See It, Now You Don’t and Nutritional Freedom, the Frog in the Water.

I feel sure that, one day, justice and common sense will prevail and consumers will assert their right to have whatever form of healing they choose for themselves, but it could be a long time yet before this happens and things may well get much more difficult in the meantime.

Those who ask what can be done about this situation might care to examine the work of Dr Joseph Mercola, whose website has been the most visited natural medicine site in the world for the last seven years, and is now also in the top ten most visited general health sites.

In the last year, mercola.com has been instrumental in educating the public about the truth behind the Swine Flu debacle. In partnership with the National Vaccine Information Centre, mercola.com helped avoid the use of squalene in the H1N1 vaccine in the US, as well as helping to prevent mandatory H1N1 vaccination, and saving the majority of US citizens from being duped by the massive PR media campaigns into accepting an unsafe and ineffective vaccine.

This is just one example of what can be achieved when individuals are appropriately informed and enabled by the internet to make a stand against scheming corporations and a clueless government, and I urge everyone who cares about maintaining freedom of choice in healthcare to join the Mercola online community and/or to bookmark the Mercola Natural Health Newsletter (or RSS link) and the Mercola Vital Votes Blog (or RSS link).

This will keep you up to date with the latest news on health and provide sound, impartial advice on how to maintain your well-being by the most natural means possible. It will also keep you abreast of the activities of those who would sacrifice your health for dubious motives. The latter are clearly stealing some of the skirmishes but, if they go on to win the war, it will be because we have let them!

As for the three companies mentioned above, the prosecution of the Bechard family by the Missouri State Milk Board and Attorney General for selling raw milk in contravention of state regulations is ongoing. The Welsh sleep-aid manufacturer is now getting back on its feet following its prosecution, and has already picked up an award for its reformulated product, Asphalia, which I can personally vouch for as a remarkably effective and side effect-free sleep-aid. Autoimmune Therapies, meanwhile, have completed the relocation of their production department and should begin shipping hookworm again this week, with whipworm to follow in a few weeks time.

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Wriggling out of food intolerance and fatigue

Thursday, December 3rd, 2009

Taking part in the Hookworms for Crohn’s Disease trial at Nottingham University in 2007 had provided me with a brief but tantalising glimpse of how my health might be improved by hosting a small colony of benign intestinal worms, and I was determined to acquire a long-term infection as soon as possible.

To this end, I had secured the agreement of my gastroenterologist, who referred me back to the trial team for reinfection. However, in spite of an earlier indication that they would be willing to provide me with a further dose of hookworm, the trial coordinator then told me that this would not be possible until the study was complete.

This was a considerable disappointment because the trial was taking an inordinately long time – probably due to difficulty finding sufficient volunteers willing to host a small worm colony – and it became clear that the trial would not be complete until the middle of 2009.

In the meantime, I had required further bowel surgery, to repair yet more Crohn’s-related intestinal strictures, and I was still unable to eat any normal foods due to multiple allergies and overwhelming food intolerance, not to mention having a number of other long-term health problems, including M.E., a subgroup of Chronic Fatigue Syndrome characterised by inordinately exaggerated exhaustion following any activity, either physical or mental.

I was becoming impatient… (continued)

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Asthma treatments – ancient and modern

Saturday, November 7th, 2009

All that is required to effect significant improvement in asthma is a small dose of benign intestinal worms.

‘Helminthic Therapy‘, as it is called, is entirely safe, and one dose is effective for an average of five years.

However, medicine is going through a period of parasite paranoia at the present time, so doctors are ignoring the evidence and denying patients this very simple and natural preventive/treatment option, offering, instead, a range of pharmaceuticals which, in many cases, have devastating long term consequences; surgery; and, now, an electrical stimulation technique in which an electrode is inserted under the skin of the neck into the tissue surrounding the carotid artery and vagus nerve and used to deliver electric shocks of up to 12 volts.

A small but growing number of asthma sufferers are turning their backs on these modern medical options and choosing to place their health in the hands of a few of the gut worms which had effectively protected humans from asthma for millennia, until we interrupted their life cycle by donning shoes and deffaecating in toilets.

The first group of pioneers who obtained their worms from Autoimmune Therapies have reported an average response rate of 83 per cent, and an average degree of improvement of 4 on a 5-point scale – a significant reduction in symptoms, which became evident from an average 4.8 months after the worms were reintroduced.

I don’t have asthma myself, but have acquired a small colony of hookworm to treat overwhelming food intolerance and chronic fatigue, both of which are responding remarkably well to this approach. Having had my worms for several months I am now completely unaware of their presence, except for the huge improvement in my health, for which I am constantly thankful. If I did have asthma, there is no way that I would subject myself to any of the medical treatments currently on offer, when such a simple, natural and safe option is available.

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Doctors blame patients for asthma treatment failure

Saturday, October 31st, 2009

And, as this article explains, they do have a point, because medication non-compliance is a considerable problem, especially as many drugs need to be taken continuously, or for a specified period of time in order to be effective.

Interrupting, or failing to complete a course of treatment can have serious consequences for the patient and can have other effects, such as encouraging the development of drug-resistant bacteria.

However, many people lead very full and busy lives, and remembering to take medication is something that may easily slip the mind in the course of a hectic day, and this is one of several reasons why I like the idea of helminthic therapy so much.

Once you have got your dose of ‘medicine’, that’s it for the lifetime of the organism employed – five years in the case of hookworm. You can then literally forget about your treatment and get on with living your life.

It can take several months for the helminths to become established and start to do whatever it is that they do, but, from then on, the benefits are none-stop, 24/7, and, in the case of asthma, this approach is proving to be over 80 per cent effective.

These personal accounts demonstrate the success of using this approach to treat asthma.

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Breathing technique eases asthma, but is outperformed by worms

Wednesday, October 7th, 2009

A new study is to test the hypothesis that patients may be able to reduce both the severity and frequency of asthma attacks by doing nothing more than improving their breathing technique.

Researchers from Southern Methodist University in Dallas have developed a four-week program to teach asthmatics how to deal more effectively with the acute symptoms of their condition and reduce the risk of future attacks by improving their breathing technique.

Patients on the program will learn to normalize and reverse chronic over-breathing, which usually causes sufferers to hyperventilate during an attack as a result of breathing fast and deep against constricted airways in an attempt to fight the overwhelming feeling of oxygen deprivation.

The biofeedback-based Capnometry-Assisted Respiratory Training (CART) used in the program employs a hand-held device called a capnometer, to enable patients to see the amount of CO2 they exhale, and use this measure to learn how to breathe more slowly, shallowly and regularly.

Whilst this particular biofeedback approach may be new, the idea of using breathing training to ease asthma is not. Yogic breathing has long been claimed to be able to help asthma, and its value was found somewhat helpful in a clinical trial at Nottingham City Hospital where all aspects of lung function and symptoms were found to improve a little – though not significantly – as a result of combining a pranayama-like technique with the aid of a Pink City Lung Exerciser device.

A further study at Nottingham found no benefit from using the Pink City Lung Exerciser, but did conclude that the Buteyko breathing technique, with which the PCLE was compared, can improve symptoms and reduce bronchodilator use in patients with asthma, although even this did not change bronchial responsiveness or lung function.

Overall, there have been very few studies of the effect of breathing techniques on asthma, and none has proved conclusively that they have a direct physiological effect. It might be that what benefits breathing training does have are more the result of increased relaxation and improved psychological processes, than of any direct biological impact on the chronic underlying physiological causes of the asthma itself.

Moreover, it takes time to learn breathing techniques, and they then need to be practised regularly, raising the question whether the benefits justify the commitment and effort involved.

The fact that a treatment with a less-than-glowing track record is still being actively pursued by researchers, is a clear indication that, despite all the hype, medicine still lacks a satisfactory solution for asthma. It is therefore not surprising that a growing number of asthmatics are turning to Helminthic Therapy, for which there is already considerable evidence of effectiveness against this condition.

After an initial settling-in period, the tiny worms used in this form of treatment begin to exert an influence on the host’s immune system to prevent this from harming them. Their immune modification also reduces the inflammation which underlies asthma, causing a reduction or, more usually, a complete cessation of symptoms.

One of a number of arguments for this back-to-the-future treatment is that, once they have received the worms, the patient can then effectively forget about their treatment – and their asthma – for approximately five years, which is the average life span of hookworm, the organism usually employed for this purpose.

All that is required to maintain freedom from asthma is a further dose of hookworm every five years . There are no tablets to be taken, no long-term side effects to be suffered, and no daily breathing exercises to be done!

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