using roundworms to modulate inflammatory immune response
 

Opening a Can of Worms
A father’s determination to help his son resulted in an experimental treatment for autism that uses roundworms to modulate inflammatory immune responses. Can the worms be used to treat other diseases?...

...“From what we know from epidemiological studies with helminth infections and from animal studies and from the clinical studies done by Joel Weinstock,” she says, “it is clear that there is a good chance that TSO could fine tune or modulate inflammation/immunity in many diseases where it is now clear that inflammation/immunity plays a critical role.”...

Read more: Opening a Can of Worms - The Scientist - Magazine of the Life Sciences http://www.the-scientist.com/article...#ixzz1DhrGg3gh
...

more worm related articles
 

Fascinating reports, as are some of the others posted recently.

It is very interesting that people are hugely concerned for the safety aspects of such controversial treatments, where naturally occurring, and co-existing smaller life forms are used. Contrast this with the huge confidence and often unquestioned faith in chemical solutions in the round. People seem to have no fear overall fear of these substance many of which are destructive to these smaller life forms.

I am going somewhere with this, it is not just a criticism. For too long there has been an assumption that stamping out bacteria, parasites, viruses, so-called pests, etc is the way to human health and to food production and a whole host of other things. While it would seem logical that something like polio should be eradicated, and anopheles stopped from spreading malaria, and that antibiotics have in general been a blessing for the world, there has always been a dilemma - are we also destroying things that are beneficial.

I guess we have been, and maybe what people are finding out now will herald a new era of life sciences, which are dedicated to preserving things that we cannot do without, like our poor, devastated gastric flora! And a great many other things.

There is a lot to be said for viewing the whole of life as being interdependent, and some of the ills of the developed world have come from ignoring this proposition. There has to be a wider view.........

Lindy