Tapeworm-Associated Epilepsy on the Rise

It was the work of the lunar god, a “disease of the moon,” thought the Mesopotamians. The Romans attributed it to demonic possession. Priests and peasants in the Middle Ages considered the “falling sickness” a contagious evil. Today our understanding of seizures and epilepsy rests not with lunar cycles or the supernatural, but with scientific insights into the developing brain and the pathologies of various diseases. We now know that there are over forty different disease processes that can cause the syndrome known as epilepsy, ranging from metabolic disorders to tumors, from trauma to congenital diseases. The leading causative agent of acquired epilepsy in the world, however, is an infectious one, a possession not by a pernicious and paranormal presence but by a parasite: the pork tapeworm, Taenia solium.