Pork tapeworm and cysticercosis

Taenia solium is a tapeworm that people get from eating raw or undercooked "measly pork". The pork meat has cysticerci (the larval stage) which in the human intestine mature to an adult tapeworm. Here the tapeworm attaches to the intestine and produces thousands of eggs. Human cysticercosis occurs either by the direct transfer of Taenia solium eggs from the feces of people harboring an adult worm to their own mouth (autoinfection) or to the mouth of another individual, or indirectly by ingestion of food or water contaminated with the eggs. When the person ingests the eggs, the embryo escape from the shell and penetrates the intestinal wall, gets into the blood vessels, where they spread to muscle, or more seriously, the eyes, heart or brain. Parasitology teacher and author of the book Parasites: Tales of Humanity's Most Unwelcome Guests, Rosemary Drisdelle joins to discuss the cestode.