The mystery over a insect infestation found in a Vietnamese military personnel last year has been solved , though not without adding another creepy wrinkle to the tale . The worms inside the humankind were n’t the Guinea dirt ball ( Dracunculus medinensis ) , a now - rarified parasite on the threshold of obliteration , as originally retrieve . Instead , they were a related and unknown metal money of Dracunculus likely aboriginal to the area . Whether this other dirt ball impersonate any current or future threat to world is still undecipherable .
In June 2020 , media outlets in Vietnam reported on the unusual showcase of a 23 - class - quondam man who had visited a hospital with abscesses along his branch and neck . Doctors eventually learn and pulled out five grownup worms , each around 1 to 2 metrical foot longsighted , from the man ’s wounds , as well as larvae . The piece was given antiparasitics and no further infestations were report .
At the metre , a doctor on the shell was quoted as saying that the man seemed to haveGuinea dirt ball disease , which would have been an alarming discovery for several reasons . In the 1980s , millions of people throughout Asia and Africa contracted these torturing and sometimes permanently debilitating infections every twelvemonth . But decades of grueling public health work have drive the worm to near extinction preserve in a few select regions of Africa . ( In 2020 , only 27 cases werereportedin total . ) Despite some setbacks lately , it ’s hoped that by 2030 , Guinea worm will be the second human pathogen ever fullywiped out , following variola . So to find the Guinea worm thousands of miles away from its last known vestiges , and in an sphere where it ’s never been discovered , would have raised some serious fear .
The man sought treatment for his illness at a hospital in Hanoi.Photo: Linh Pham (Getty Images)
Outside experts whospoketo Gizmodo at the time were skeptical that this really was Guinea insect . Adam Weiss , theatre director of the Guinea Worm Eradication Program at the Carter Center , a human right wing organization founded by former U.S. chairman Jimmy Carter , even mentioned the distinct hypothesis that the man ’s plague was triggered by another coinage of Dracunculus . And that theory was right on the money .
Like many parasites , dissimilar fellow member of Dracunculus infest different elemental species . D. medinensis is the only know dirt ball to specifically thirst for human hosts , for instance , and there are other specie that go after mammals and reptile . The doctor concluded that the piece ’s worms tolerate a closer physical resemblance to reptile - eff louse than to any human and mammal louse . But only a few Dracunculus species have had their gene study up close , and the analyzed worm did n’t match up to any of these species . It ’s potential that the worm could belong to a species already distinguish but not genetically sequenced , but for now , its identity element is still a interrogation mark .
Another lingering thread left to be take out at is whether this incident was a one - off event or the first signs of an emerging disease in the area . Dracunculus worms have their preferences , but they do occasionally jump the specie barrier — an ability that ’s really stymied the Guinea dirt ball eradication effort in late years , as the worms have started to overrun dogs in certain areas . And there have been suspected cases of other non - Guinea but Dracunculus human plague periodically reported in parts of Asia over the years .
A Guinea worm being extracted from a child’s foot at a containment center in Savelugu, Ghana in a March 2007 photo. The worm found in the Vietnam case was a related species, possibly native to reptiles.Photo: Olivier Asselin (AP)
So just because this unknown worm may not usually pick on humans , that does n’t preclude the possibility that it someday could . We also do n’t know how the worms even end up in the man ’s torso , though the leading theories are that he either drank water contaminated with infected copepods ( small crustaceans that are part of the worms ’ life cycle ) or rust contaminated sore fish .
“ The rude hosts and road of pic of this presumably zoonotic Dracunculus [ species ] have yet to be resolved and justify further probe and surveillance for similar cases in humans and animal in the region , ” the author write .
In an accompanyingeditorial , infective disease researchers Martin Grobusch and Thomas Hänscheid laid out the numerous unreciprocated questions and caution against being too optimistic that this case was a rarified event , at least not without more investigating .
“ However , it does not seem to be too far - fetched to propose that we might be dealing with one of nature ’s curiosities rather than the advent of a new emerge helminth pathogenic to humans , ” they write .
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