Man Ate Uncooked Frogs, Got Tapeworm In Brain, Removed After 15 Years

A 26-year-old man in China was living with a tapeworm in his brain for 15 years, as a result of eating live frogs during his childhood.

The man, known only by the pseudonym Wu Yong, from Changsha County, Hunan Province in China, discovered that his brain was infested by a tapeworm after he got admitted to a hospital on Dec. 29, following severe headache that made it difficult for him to even walk properly. In addition, Wu suffered from muscle weakness, swallowing and speech difficulty, as well as coordination issues.

When he initially got admitted to the Changsha Central Hospital, He Guohua, deputy director of the Department of Neurology, told China News that they thought the man was having a stroke. However, an MRI scan revealed Wu’s condition was more complicated than that.

The doctors discovered a lesion inside his brain and on closer examination, deduced that the man was suffering from a parasitic infection. An immediate surgery was carried out and a Sparganum mansoni – a kind of tapeworm normally found inside the intestines of cats and dogs – was removed from Wu’s brain.

Since the parasite was not normally discovered inside humans, Wu was questioned by the doctors as to how the tapeworm might have found its way into his body. As it turned out, he had suffered a fractured limb when he was a child and believing in an ancient folklore remedy, he consumed uncooked frogs for several days in order to heal his injuries faster.

From his history, the doctors concluded the tapeworm was in larvae form inside a frog that Wu had consumed during his childhood and as time passed, it made the man’s body its host and grew in size, feeding off it. “When people eat these animals, it is very likely that the eggs of the ticks will parasitize in the human body to breed and become larvae,” the doctor said.

This is not the first time a case like Wu’s has presented itself in front of the doctors. Back in March, a woman from Jiaqing in east China's Zhejiang province had to get a massive tapeworm removed from one of her breasts, which she had gotten by eating five live frogs believing it would relieve rheumatism in her legs, according to Mail Online.

Although modern doctors in China have time and again advised people against opting for bizarre and dangerous remedies like consuming unprepared animal meats including that of amphibians, there are still people who believe in ancient cures that popular legends and myths speak of. A book written by physician and herbalist Li Shizhen, “The Compendium of Materia Medica,” talks about people in the 1500s using crushed pulp of tadpoles to “cure” sores or welts.