Travel Giant tapeworm on display at Tokyo parasite museum

[thomas]

The Meguro Parasitological Museum in Tokyo displays what is presumed to be one of the longest human tapeworms: an 8.8-meter-long specimen recovered intact from a hapless diner's intestine.

Toshiaki Kuramochi, the museum director, explains how its main showpiece was acquired:

"In the 1980s, a man in his 40s discovered a white thread-like object in his feces," Kuramochi said. "Dr. Satoru Kamegai, our museum's first director, had the man take an agent that gets rid of parasites." And, the story goes, the giant Dibothriocephalus nihonkaiensis tapeworm was expelled from the patient's anus. "It measured a staggering 8.8 meters, as shown here," Kuramochi said. It is likely that the tapeworm was acquired orally. Suspicion fell on cherry-salmon sashimi that the man had consumed three months earlier. The food would have contained a tiny larval form of the tapeworm, which matured and grew 10 centimeters per day in the victim's intestine. "Patients are unaware of the parasite until its fragments are eliminated from their bodies because it generally causes no symptoms," Kuramochi said.

Giant tapeworm hooks you in the gut at Tokyo parasite museum | The Asahi Shimbun: Breaking News, Japan News and Analysis

If you are in the mood for more gore, visit the museum or check out our very own article:

Museum  Meguro Parasitological Museum

The Meguro Parasitological Museum (目黒寄生虫館) goes under your skin, arguably the world's only exhibition wholly dedicated to roundworms, hookworms, flukes, nematodes, leeches, and other bloodsuckers. Located in a small inconspicuous office building in a residential area of Tokyo, its two floors...

• JREF
• 6 Apr 2012
• Category: Tokyo

 

[Mikawa Ossan]

Japan has some of the most unexpected but amazing museums out there. If I'm ever in the area, I have to check this one out!

 

[Grandpa Frank]