RFK Jr. says he had a dead worm in his brain. What are these parasites and how common are they?

Presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has made various claims about his health over the years, but the most shocking came Wednesday when it was revealed that Kennedy once insisted that a worm died in his brain over a decade ago.

Kennedy’s assertion, which was reported by The New York Times, was made during divorce proceedings from his second wife, Mary Richardson Kennedy, and was intended to support his claim that health issues had reduced his earning potential.

Kennedy reportedly disclosed the ailment during a court deposition, saying that in 2010 he was experiencing memory loss and severe mental fogginess. He said he consulted with several neurologists who examined brain scans and suspected he had a brain tumor, and he was scheduled to undergo surgery.

But then a doctor at New York-Presbyterian Hospital told Kennedy he believed the scans revealed a dead parasite in his brain.

The abnormality that was seen on his scans “was caused by a worm that got into my brain and ate a portion of it and then died,” the article reported Kennedy as saying in the 2012 deposition.

No medical proof has been offered to back up the candidate’s claims, but the issue has prompted widespread conversation about the existence of brain worms, as well as the candidate’s fitness for office.

There are several parasites that can do damage in the human brain, but the most common in the Americas is the pork tapeworm, Taenia solium. In the intestines, the worm can grow to 2 to 7 meters in length. Though its eggs can migrate from the intestines to tissues throughout the body, in all other organs the larvae dies before reaching maturity.

The tapeworm’s eggs are found in the feces of an infected person, and they can spread to other hosts who consume food or water contaminated by the feces. If someone touches a contaminated surface and then puts their fingers in their mouth without washing their hands, they can ingest the eggs as well.

Once swallowed, the eggs find their way into skeletal muscles or other tissues, where they form cysts and cause the disease known as cysticercosis.

According to medical experts, the condition Kennedy described sounds like neurocysticercosis, a disease that occurs when pork tapeworm larvae become enclosed in a cyst in the human brain.

...continued

swipe to next page