To the Point on Parasites
Parasites will control you if you can't control them
The Forgotten Microbe
Parasites are a particular type of pathogen that are thought to benefit from the host, without benefiting the host in any way, they’re the prototypical vampires of the microbial community. They can infect various organs, feed off the food the host consumes either directly in the GI tract, or after it’s been processed and absorbed from the bloodstream - i.e. many are literally bloodsuckers. They can also exert dramatic degrees of control over their hosts (a la the mesmerizing powers of an old-timey vampire) by hijacking the same signaling pathways the host brain and organs use to send hormonal messages. They do this in order to survive and propagate.
For example there’s a common parasite called Toxoplasma gondii that spends part of its life cycle in mice and another part in cats (and is a serious infectious threat to human cat owners too). Once it infects mice it changes their neurochemistry to make them attracted instead of repelled by the pheromonal stench of cat urine, increases their risk-taking behaviors and slows their reaction times. This greatly increases the likelihood the infected mice will end up being eaten by a cat, putting the parasite that was pulling the strings all along into its next host so it can complete its life cycle and continue to propagate.
Even more horrifying, the “zombie” ant fungus, Ophiocordyceps unilateralis, is a parasitic fungus that infects carpenter ants, manipulating their behavior to ensure its own reproduction. The fungus attaches to the ant and drills into its exoskeleton. Fungal cells feed on the ant's insides and spread throughout its body. The fungus releases chemicals that compel the ant to leave its colony and climb to a high point, typically on a branch. The ant then bites down in a "death grip" and eventually dies, a fungal stalk shoots out of its head and releases its spores to infect other ants. This dramatic manipulation of the ant’s behavior ensures the fungus’s life cycle continues.
Writing prescriptions pays the bills, but I want to benefit people more than pills possibly can. That’s what this blog is about: finding and spreading unknown or lost knowledge that finally convinces people to take their physical and spiritual health seriously and get the most they can out of their limited time here on earth. If you also want that for your friends and family and the rest of humanity then you can help me by upgrading to a paid subscription that will help me make even more and better content.
You can also help by sharing this and every other post you value far and wide.
Thanks for reading. You are the reason I write.
But, surely human beings aren’t so susceptible to behavior modification as ants and mice?
Well, you might be surprised just how sensitive your personality, emotions and behaviors are to external manipulation, though when you give it some thought you really shouldn’t be - just consider what relatively small quantities of alcohol and illicit drugs can do to people.
But it’s not just drugs of abuse we need to be concerned about, it’s also common over the counter drugs you wouldn’t expect and the changes often escape notice because they’re so subtle. But subtle or not they can have profound impacts on our choices. For example, over-the-counter Tylenol and ibuprofen make people less empathetic, which can significantly interfere with healthy relationships and even end important ones like marriages.
Similarly over the counter Benadryl can cause mood disturbances. Common Parkinson’s drugs like ropinirole and pramipexole can cause increased risk taking behavior (one man, profiled in an interview famously became a gambling addict). Ironically, some drugs marketed as “antidepressants” include the side effect of suicidality, especially in teenagers. Accutane, used for acne can also make its users depressed and suicidal. Smoking cessation drug Chantix can lead to hyper-aggression and suicidality. A very commonly prescribed class of heart and blood pressure medications, the beta blockers, often make patients less motivated and less emotional.
But the greatest self-altering drug most people use on a daily basis is social media. The famous Facebook emotional manipulation study from 2012 showed tiny effect sizes, but only because it was so crudely done. With modern AI-driven algorithms its childs play to manipulate users. Anyway, traditional media, private marketers and public institutions have been manipulating us for generations (it recently became legal for the US government to propagandize Americans).
As for parasites, it turns out we’re just as susceptible to having our inner selves hijacked by them as the ants and mice are.
Toxoplasma gondii, the same protozoan parasite we discussed infecting mice, is transmitted to humans primarily through contact with cat feces, contaminated food, or mother to child during pregnancy. Infected humans may show the same increased risk-taking behavior and slower reaction times found in affected mice. Studies suggest that chronic infection may be linked to personality changes, including reduced fear and possibly increased impulsivity. There are also associations between T. gondii infection and an increased likelihood of developing psychiatric conditions such as schizophrenia.
Some personal preferences are also associated with a much higher chance of being infected by parasites. For example gay men are more than twice as likely (over 70% incidence) to be infected with parasites than straight men.
However it is not at all easy to diagnose parasitic infections. Stool tests are notoriously unreliable, with different samples and different labs commonly reporting entirely different results. Many experts will order multiple stool tests over time from 3+ labs, knowing that even then they may miss the problem. The reason they seemingly go overboard like that is that often only one sample of many sent to one of multiple labs will reveal the parasites that are actually there.
What appear to be extreme measures turn out to be well justified.
Given the frequency of parasite die-off in our patients, it’s entirely possible that a significant percentage of all people with chronic health issues harbor parasites, and those who are diagnosed with them simply have the highest parasite burdens or happen to be tested during just the right time in the parasite’s life cycle.
Thank you to our paid subscribers, you are supporting our efforts to heal humanity by reviving long lost knowledge. If you can’t financially support us in our mission you can still come back and read the rest of this post in 3 days time when it unlocks automatically. Knowledge is precious and our fervent hope is that the knowledge here finds all of those will benefit from it.
On social media there are numerous examples of people reporting the sudden loss of desire for anal sex (a good way to increase likelihood of transmission) after taking ivermectin or some other anti-parasitic medication. In some cases they didn’t even make the connection until months or years later.
Same goes for alcoholism, sugar cravings, and smoking, to name only a few common behaviors that have been linked to parasites.
According to the research, alcoholic patients are more likely to be infected with the parasite Strongyloides. Drinking raises human stress hormone levels which make the female parasites more fertile, and make their young more infectious. The alcohol also alters the gut barrier and immunity which both also contribute to more severe infection with Strongyloides.
Below are the confirmatory experiences of real people replying to a series of threads on Twitter discussing parasites, many referring to their own and others experiences after taking ivermectin or other substances with anti-parasitic effects, often for something other than parasites, eg as treatment for COVID-19:
The Intelligence Thief
Turns out there are “IQ parasites” too.
A 2008 study found that Brazilian children infected with hookworms performed worse on cognitive tests than uninfected ones. Children infected with more than one type of intestinal parasite performed even worse than those infected with only one. Intestinal parasites in school children have also been linked to stunting of growth, physical weakness, and low educational achievement.
According to a 2010 study by University of New Mexico scientists Christopher Eppig, Corey Fincher, and Randy Thornhill, the prevalence of parasites in a country may be related to international differences in intelligence. The "parasite-stress hypothesis", suggests that children who get parasites use more energy fighting off the infection, leaving less energy for brain development. The study found a strong correlation between average IQ and parasite stress across all nations and within each continent, except South America. The scientists believe that infectious disease is the most powerful predictor of average national IQ, even when other factors like temperature, education, and GDP per capita are controlled.
Once you see it you can’t stop seeing it, or suspecting it may be contributory to any number of diseases, but it’s important to realize that simply killing off parasites without addressing the deeper underpinnings of disease will not solve the real problem that the disease is manifesting. Sure the symptoms may vanish in the short term, but if the underlying organ is still weak it will continue to build toxicity due to inadequate detoxification, and will be prone to being infiltrated by parasites once again, and even if none of that happens a new sign, symptom or full blown disease will usually crop up at some later date, because the energetic imbalance remains. And the energy depends on something in the psyche, where the real problem lies.
Don’t Oversimplify
While it’s important not to oversimplify anything when it comes to human beings, at least some of the time parasites may be the primary superficial cause of symptoms or historically marginal proclivities like same sex attraction. However, this doesn’t mean the parasites are necessarily the only cause, or the primary one.
Parasites tend to infect certain bodily environments more readily than others, and this isn’t by chance. When individuals deviate from societal norms, it subconsciously triggers their neurological fear circuitry which is genetically and epigenetically encoded and passed down across deep ancestral time, leading to a profound stress response that elevates cortisol levels, which likewise lead to elevated estrogen levels.
Modern science has proven that the experiences of parents can be passed down to their children epigenetically. Take for example male lab mice who were shocked each time they smelled almonds, a scent they would normally be attracted to. They were subsequently mated with female mice and the resulting children showed fear responses to the smell of almonds, despite never having been shocked themselves. If something like this can be passed from father to baby mouse in one generation, imagine the reinforcement learning from hundreds of generations before you, most of whom, certainly throughout recorded history, were rather prudish by modern standards.
The overactive hormonal milieu triggered by stepping out of line compared to ancestral norms creates a toxic, immunosuppressive environment in the body that becomes particularly inviting to parasites for the very reason that it leaves the body’s usually robust defenses for fighting off parasites weakened.
Moreover, it's widely acknowledged that engaging in anal sex increases exposure to a range of harmful microorganisms, so the overall microbial load in these cases can be significantly higher. What many people label "worms" or parasites often aren’t a single organism but rather what’s known as a pathogenic biofilm community. In these biofilm communities, a wide array of microorganisms connect and function together as if they were a single organism, held together by a fibrous matrix, much like our own cells and beneficial microbiome live together in a close-knit communal
”super-organism.”
Biofilms are a mucus-like substance and are formed for different reasons - some are beneficial and some harmful. The body, for instance, may create therapeutic biofilms as a protective measure against toxins and heavy metals. In contrast, pathogenic biofilms are formed by harmful microorganisms, including parasites, to shield themselves from the body's immune responses, antibiotics, and antimicrobials. By hiding within these biofilms, pathogens can evade treatment and persist in the body, making infections much more difficult to combat. This distinction between therapeutic and pathogenic biofilms is key in understanding how microorganisms, especially parasites, survive and proliferate in environments that should otherwise be hostile to them.
Managing Parasites
Historically, all over the world people took anti parasitic herbs or drugs with some regularity, the same way animals today are given regular dewormings. Many in third world countries have over the counter access to anti-parasitic pharmaceuticals like ivermectin and albendazole and take them.
However in modern industrialized societies we’ve mostly lost this concern with parasites, primarily I think due to a common logical fallacy of believing what we can see (or in this case detect) is all that exists, i.e. the famous streetlight fallacy from the old joke:
A policeman sees a drunk man searching for something under a streetlight and asks what he lost. “My keys,” the man replies. The policeman helps him search for a while and then asks, “Are you sure you lost them here?” “No,” says the drunk, “I lost them in the park.” Policeman: “Then why are you looking here?” Drunk: “Because this is where the light is.”
Basically, our medical establishment doesn't believe any of us have parasites because every time they check for them they don’t find them.
Basically our parasite tests are no good for a number of reasons, which explain why different labs will give different results on the same test samples, and even if samples are sent to many labs, parasites may still be missed:
Intermittent Shedding – Many parasites are not consistently present in stool, blood, or other samples, leading to false negatives.
Low Sensitivity of Microscopy – Traditional stool tests rely on manual examination, which can miss parasites due to their small size or low numbers.
Inadequate Sample Collection – Single-sample tests may not capture intermittent parasite presence; multiple samples over days are often needed, but not often done, and even when they are can still miss parasite presence.
Morphological Similarities – Some parasites resemble debris or harmless organisms, leading to misidentification.
Immune Evasion – Certain parasites hide in tissues (e.g., liver, brain, or intestines) rather than circulating in blood or stool.
Limited Testing Methods – Many labs only test for a small subset of known parasites, missing rarer or emerging species.
PCR and Antibody Limitations – Molecular (PCR) and serological (antibody) tests may fail if parasite DNA or immune responses are too low to detect.
Unstable Samples – Parasites may degrade or become unrecognizable if samples are not properly preserved or analyzed quickly.
What this means is that we have to assume we have parasites. This seems a safe assumption to me since every single chronic disease patient we’ve treated with a proper sustained parasite cleanse has passed obvious visually identifiable intestinal worms in their stool. Not everyone who takes antiparasitics will pass parasites right away, but if they complete a comprehensive detox protocol that marshals their own immune system to mobilize dormant or hiding parasites from deep within biofilms, they invariably pass parasites within weeks.
So to treatment then. There is no generic protocol that is optimal for everyone. Some people will be happy with taking ivermectin and fenben every 6-12 months, whether or not they pass any parasites or feel any different after doing so. Others will add some herbs like turmeric, wormwood extract, oregano oil, or broad spectrum antimicrobial chemicals like chlorine dioxide. Others will add liver and gallbladder support, which is very important, since many of these affect the liver gallbladder system, and it’s a primary passage of elimination, with many parasites ending up in the stool after being ejected from various tissues and passing through the blood to the liver for final elimination. So castor oil packs and coffee enemas can be important. Also giving up anger and allaying chronic anxiety and fear are important for boosting health of tissues affected by parasites, these can be accomplished with various modalities like breathwork, inttellectyual regrounding and neural retraining. Binders like chlorella and others can be important if parasite die off releases toxins. Diet is likely more important than most will appreciate since it so intimately ties into gut and liver health, which are so important for successfully clearing stubborn parasites.
Overall it’s important not to be too extreme too fast especially utilizing unnatural approaches. Complex ecologise like the body resist changes to their equilibrium, even when the equilibrium appears unhealthy to us. The body demands respect, otherwise it resits or simply breaks under undue pressure. Take it easy and slow and you'll accomplish a lot more than if you take it too hard and fast.