That poor patient, she was so courageous and wonderful,” Senanayake said. “You don’t want to be the first patient in the world with a roundworm found in pythons and we really take our hats off to her. She’s been wonderful.
“The patient resides near a lake area inhabited by carpet pythons. Despite no direct snake contact, she often collected native grasses, including warrigal greens, from around the lake to use in cooking, Senanayake said.
The doctors and scientists involved in her case hypothesise that a python may have shed the parasite via its faeces into the grass. They believe the patient was probably infected with the parasite directly from touching the native grass or after eating the greens.”
Ophidascaris robertsi is a roundworm usually found in pythons. The Canberra hospital patient marks the world-first case of the parasite being found in humans.
The patient resides near a lake area inhabited by carpet pythons. Despite no direct snake contact, she often collected native grasses, including warrigal greens, from around the lake to use in cooking, Senanayake said.
The doctors and scientists involved in her case hypothesise that a python may have shed the parasite via its faeces into the grass. They believe the patient was probably infected with the parasite directly from touching the native grass or after eating the greens.
Moral of the story: make sure you wash all the snake shit off your produce and hands before eating.
Maybe this is a cultural difference. In the USA we don’t call any produce “grass”, other than things like lemon grass, which gets called by its full name. No one would say “grass” when referring to spinach. Actual grass, like lawn grass, or plains grass, doesn’t really have much nutritional value to us because our stomachs can’t break it down enough.
Nah it is commonly used to describe plants in the Poaceae family which includes grains, rice, bamboo, sugar cane and lots of others.
Spinach is not in that family.
Thanks for curing me of my ignorance. I’ll remember to say “I’d like a steaming hot bowl of grass” next time I order rice at a restaurant. You’re the best!
I don’t understand why youre being down voted, it’s like saying “oh yeah, love me some tomatoes in my fruit salad”. Like sure, tomatoes are fruits, but you’re not going to receive one if you ever like order “fruit”.
Only of scientific terms. Technically, these are cereal grasses, while lawn grass is not the same thing. But yeah, saying “it’s cultural” doesn’t look good.
I mean, it’s maybe cultural to a degree, it’s an Australian article and I’m American, but like, it’s still grass. “Actual” isn’t a scientific or technical term.
And for all we know, she was picking lemongrass in addition to the greens.
You don’t have to eat a round worm for it to get all up in you. They can enter through the skin on your hands and feet. medlineplus.gov/ency/article/000630.htm
oh I got the answer after reading the article. the lady gathers plants from an area where the snakes live to cook with, so they think maybe there were some live larve in some snake poop that she accidentally mixed into her cooking and ate
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