Woman's tweet convinces thousands they have pinworms
When they say parenting isn't easy, most people envision sleepless nights and diaper blowouts. Most people don't consider that one day their parenting journey may include deworming your child. Kids, especially younger kids, are prone to contracting pinworms due to how contagious they are and how often kids put their fingers in their mouths. But is this something adults also need to worry about?
Mary-Cate Delvey, a veterinary technician shares, "Friendly vet tech PSA to please deworm yourselves. Seriously, you can get pyrantel pamoate on Amazon and it tastes like a banana smoothie. Why are fecal parasite screenings not part of human healthcare. You probably have worms. Just please do it."
File:Strongyloides Storcoralis Lifecycle Diagram.jpg - Wikimedia ...commons.wikimedia.org
Well, you can't say something like that in the big giant world of the internet and not expect a disproportionate response. But she's not the only person to either ask the question if people should be deworming as frequently as they deworm their pets, or even suggest that deworming is essential. Sure, pinworms are extremely contagious and here's why–their eggs are practically microscopic, carried under the fingernails and stick to everything.
Basically anything an infected person touches now likely has eggs on it, so if you touch it, you now have undetectable eggs on your fingers that can end up in your mouth for the parasite to start its life cycle in your small intestine and rectum. It's certainly a vision to behold in your minds eye but even given their contagion level, are they really so contagious that you need a monthly dewormer?
File:Hookworms.JPG - Wikipediaen.m.wikipedia.org
Eh, probably not. But the post sparked lots of concerned replies with one person writing, "The thought of having worms, or deworming or seeing worms horrifies me. Like to my core, this is my most unreasonable phobia."
While Delvey's post was more of a claim than a question, she's not the first person to think regular deworming should be common. In fact, a quick search will pull up multiple people pondering the same question, but like the post from X, it's a general question of human deworming without specifying which parasites you're trying to rid yourself of. The medication the vet tech tells people to get treats pinworms, which as mentioned previously are easily spread from person to person. But the thing about pinworms is, the person infected with them would be likely become very suspicious that something was a little off.
Pinworm eggs get trapped under your fingernails for one very uncomfortable reason. Nighttime scratching of an itchy anus due to the worms coming out while you're sleeping to lay their eggs around your...uh...butthole. Chances are if you're not consistently resisting the urge to get up from your bed and scoot your bottom across the carpet in your bedroom, pinworms are unlikely. Other parasites have more alarming symptoms that would certainly have the average person seeking medical attention in a developed country.
But in the United States, pinworms are the most common intestinal parasite as parasites like ascaris are spread through soil contaminated with human feces. Almost all other intestinal parasites are contracted by either touching soil contaminated with eggs and touching your mouth with an unwashed hand or in the case of hookworms, walking barefoot on soil contaminated with hookworm larvae. The exceptions are tapeworms, trichinella and flukes, the first two are contracted by eating undercooked meats of animals infected with the parasite, while flukes are contracted by drinking contaminated water or eating infected fish.
According to the World Health Organization (WHO), "Soil-transmitted helminth (STH) infections are among the most common infections worldwide with an estimated 1.5 billion infected people or 24% of the world’s population. These infections affect the poorest and most deprived communities with poor access to clean water, sanitation and hygiene in tropical and subtropical areas, with the highest prevalence reported from sub-Saharan Africa, China, South America and Asia."
This means the likelihood of parasites running rampant in the intestines of everyday Americans is pretty slim outside of the occasional pinworms a child might bring home. Though, even that doesn't necessarily require an urgent visit to the doctor. It's more of an annoyance than anything else due to the itching as the medication needed is sold over the counter at your local pharmacy for around $10.
Even the testing for pinworms doesn't involve anything super scientific that you'd need to spend hundreds of dollars on a lab test. According to the CDC, people worried that they may have the pesky parasite can simply put a strip of scotch tape near their bum hole first thing in the morning. The eggs will appear on the tape though they're small and will likely need to be seen with a microscope.
In short, do you need to have a family deworming night every few months? Probably not, though any concerns about possibly having a parasite should be discussed with your primary care doctor.