Some of us still remember the intestinal parasitic infections that could arise after eating raw or undercooked pork or beef. Aging generations have learned a medical vocabulary that has now disappeared, and have remembered certain food hygiene reflexes: "tapeworm," lecherous pig, "armed tapeworm," and all pig meat must be cooked to perfection. But food trends evolve; the trend for steak tartare, for example, beef eaten raw with multiple condiments, has dulled our suspicions about the beef tapeworm. Monitoring and food preservation methods, and changes in farming methods certainly preserve meat hygiene in France. Yet, elsewhere in the world, patients infected with a tapeworm continue to number in the millions. And living with a parasitic worm can turn into an ordeal.
Tapeworms, taeniasis and cysticercosis: everything you need to know about parasitic diseases
February 4, 2025
By Astrid Saint Auguste THE Subscribers
You've heard of tapeworms, but do you know what they are? Taenia solium And Taenia saginataintestinal parasites with which we have lost all familiarity? And their astonishing and complex mode of contamination? Make no mistake, their development cycle does not begin with the ingestion of undercooked pork or beef. It's more complicated than that!
Pork tapeworm, Taenia solium, in its adult form, is made up of three parts, here, we only see the scolex, its “head” and its neck, a thinned part. Image established by scanning electron microscopy and colorized.
STEVE GSCHMEISSNER/SCIENCE PHOTO / SGS / SPL/ AFP
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