Let us let you know a horror story.
A single-celled parasite that appears like a tiny spec of orzo pasta infects you. But it doesn’t suck your blood or siphon off a few of your meals after which be on its means. Instead, it burrows into your muscular tissues and types cysts that present a long-term hideout.
Only, that’s not the creepiest factor it does. It additionally infects your mind and hunkers down within the amygdala, the a part of the mind concerned in regulating feelings. From that perch, it has the power to alter your conduct in ways in which profit it.
This is the story of Toxoplasma gondii, and the story above is what occurs to rats when contaminated by it. Studies have proven that rats contaminated by T. gondii lose their concern of cats, which makes them a straightforward meal. This is nice for hungry cats, but it surely additionally works out nicely for the parasite, which simply so occurs to breed within the digestive tract of cats (with out harming them) and is unfold via cat poop.
“So there’s a couple of winners,” deadpans University of Colorado professor Christopher Lowry, who not too long ago printed a brand new examine illuminating heretofore unknown potential dangers from an an infection.
“It makes it sound like the pathogen is controlling our minds, but it’s kind of a co-evolutionary relationship.”
Neat?
The potential downside for us is that we could be collateral harm on this transmission cycle. Humans will also be contaminated by T. gondii and never simply via contact with cat poop. Eating unwashed greens or undercooked pork or lamb — pigs and sheep will also be contaminated — may also lead to an an infection, although it usually doesn’t make you acutely sick or require hospital therapy.
And it seems that this an infection is shockingly frequent. Lowry, a professor of integrative physiology who research the hyperlink between neural operate and emotional conduct, stated roughly 10% to fifteen% of individuals within the United States present proof of a earlier T. gondii an infection. In different international locations, it could be a lot greater — Lowry not too long ago labored on a examine folks over the age of 65 in Spain and Portugal that discovered previous an infection charges of 67%.
So that probably makes T. gondii a significant participant in human well being. But what does it do to us?
For starters, there’s some proof that it does affect human conduct and probably make folks much less risk-averse. One examine concluded that individuals who had been contaminated by T. gondii usually tend to trigger automotive accidents. Another says folks with an an infection are extra entrepreneurial. (Lowry cautions that these findings are relative to all types of persona elements — it’s not as if everybody with an an infection is racing down I-25 prefer it’s a Formula One course.)
But Lowry and a few colleagues wished to find out about different potential penalties, which brings us again to that examine on folks from Spain and Portugal. Lowry and his co-authors from CU, the University of Maryland and numerous universities in Europe checked out measures of frailty in older folks and examined whether or not there was a connection to a T. gondii an infection.
They discovered — deep exhale — that there isn’t. Just what is named seropositivity, which is whether or not somebody has ever been contaminated, there was no correlation between an an infection and frailty later in life.
But they did discover an affiliation between frailty and what’s known as serointensity. In different phrases, T. gondii could also be linked with frailty in individuals who have been contaminated rather a lot.
Lowry stated this may increasingly need to do with irritation brought on by the parasite, particularly sure strains of it.
“The more often you’ve been infected, the more often you may have been exposed to a strain that produces a stronger inflammatory response,” he stated.
Overall, Lowry stated the takeaway from the examine, which was printed earlier this month in The Journals of Gerontology, is extra of a be-aware sort of message than a be-afraid sort of message.
“From a very big-picture perspective, being infected is not a terrible thing, with one exception,” he stated. “If infants acquire the parasite from their mothers, that can have really detrimental effects. So that’s why it’s always advised that pregnant mothers don’t change the kitty litter during pregnancy.”
Even in case you are not gestating new life, you may defend your self by altering the litter field each day and washing your fingers nicely afterward, by avoiding stray cats and the areas they hang around, by totally cooking meat, and by rinsing fruit and veggies earlier than consuming.
