One of the more common, but least identified problems I find with people’s health is also one of the least discussed—and with good reason. It’s kind of disgusting. The problem is parasites. Though rarely discussed in polite conversation, I find parasites affecting people more often than you might imagine. Roughly 30 percent of my patients have a parasitic infection when they start with me. Usually, the parasite is the small, microscopic variety, but about 20 percent of the time, it’s the large, egg-laying variety (tapeworms, flukes, etc.). They can affect any organ (liver, brain, eyes) so they’re not always found on stool testing, which is Western medicine’s only route of detecting these buggers. This is one reason the diagnosis is often missed. Symptoms can be mild or even non-existent and they’re usually non-specific (fever, itching, rash) so parasites are often not even suspected. I find parasites using muscle testing and get rid of them using digestive enzymes or herbs like black walnut, wormwood, and garlic.

I have an 84-year-old patient, who also happens to be one of the most energetic, active people I know, who began losing energy and was getting light headed fairly often. She went to her M.D. who ran a blood test. The results showed she was anemic. The M.D. wanted to give her a transfusion of several units of blood right away, but the patient was against this and instead asked what I recommended. I said giving her blood would just be a band aid and it would likely need to be done over and over again unless we found out why her body wasn’t keeping up with the demand. She must either be losing blood too quickly or not making it fast enough. This made sense to her, so we did some testing. Within a few minutes, I had my diagnosis: she had parasites. I put her on some digestive enzymes and some iron and within a couple months, her anemia was gone and so were the parasites. Both she and the M.D. were amazed.

We can be infected with parasites in several different ways. Mosquitoes can carry them (malaria); they can be ingested any number of ways, such as not washing hands after cleaning the cat box, eating under-cooked pork, sushi, not washing your vegetables before eating, or “drinking the water” in a foreign country. But what’s interesting is that if one’s immune system is strong enough, it can kill parasites or perhaps even prevent the infection from occurring in the first place.

Experiments done in the 1940s and 1950s with cats showed that cats who were fed properly did not develop parasites or any of a number of degenerative diseases, while those who were fed the basic equivalent of the American diet developed all of these. Interestingly, the cats being fed “the right diet” were fed raw meat; the deficient cats were fed cooked meat. This seems somewhat counterintuitive when discussing parasites, but the fact is, raw food contains digestive enzymes whereas cooked food does not. If you recall, one way I deal with parasites is with digestive enzymes.

If you have problems that don’t seem to resolve no matter what, parasites could be the problem. Stool tests may detect them, but oftentimes they don’t. Muscle testing is one of the best ways to find parasites. If you can’t find someone to test you and you suspect parasites, you may benefit from taking digestive enzymes between meals. If that doesn’t help, try wormwood, black walnut, or garlic. It can take several months to years to fully rid oneself of parasites and the larger variety are definitely harder to kill. For those, I recommend using your remedy for 10 days, then taking five days off. This allows the eggs to hatch so they can be killed by the next wave. Cycle like this until you’re absolutely sure they’re gone.

Parasites can be passed around from person to person too, so you may want to treat the whole family and your pets at the same time. And of course, you want to do all you can to strengthen your immune system as well. Following my 20 Steps To Perfect Health™ and my "Guidelines For Healthy Living" will help you to accomplish this. If you don’t have these valuable resources yet, they are available for free on my website www.HealthIsNatural.com. Or you can get all of this information and much more by reading my book "Thugs, Drugs and the War On Bugs."

If you like this article, please rate it and Tweet it. Thanks!

Author's Bio: 

Dr. Brad Case is the author of "Thugs, Drugs and the War On Bugs," Book I in the Why We're Sick™ healthcare series and co-author of "101 Great Ways To Improve Your Health." He writes a quarterly newsletter, a monthly e-newsletter and is the clinic director of the Holistic Healing Center in Prunedale, California. To learn more or to sign up for his free e-newsletter, visit his website:www.HealthIsNatural.com. You can also follow him on Twitter @drbradcase or become a fan of Holistic Healing Center or Why We're Sick on Facebook.