Books of Interest
Website: chetyarbrough.blog
This is Your Brain on Parasites (How Tiny Creatures Manipulate Our Behavior) and Shape Society
By: Kathleen McAuliffe
Narrated By: Nicol Zanzarella
Kathleen McAuliffe (Author, science journalist who has published in The New York Times, The Atlantic, and Smithsonian. Received an M.A. in natural science from Trinty College Dublin.)
Kathleen McAuliffe apprises the public of the importance of personal health along with a somewhat bizarrely titled book “This is Your Brain on Parasites”. McAuliffe’s book is about the science of health and its maintenance. The idea of a parasite in one’s brain seems unworthy of a book because of the creepy implication of possession. However, McAuliffe refers to a physician and several research scientists that have found evidence of brain parasites that effect animal and human behavior.
Dr. Robert Sapolsky, a neuroscientist and professor at Stanford studied what is called a Toxoplasma gondii parasite. It forms cysts in brain tissue that are shown to affect human behavior. People who have developed the cysts have shown symptoms of risk-taking behavior, and mental dysfunction like schizophrenia.
Dr. Jaroslav Flegr is a parasitologist, evolutionary biologist and professor of biology at the Faculty of Science, and professor at Charles University in Prague.
McAuliffe meets with a Czech scientist, Dr. Jaroslav Flegr, who conducted research showing the Toxoplasma gondii parasite in cat feces can infect the brain of a human being. The author meets other American research scientists that show how parasites infect animal brains whose behavior is affected in ways that are not natural to their species. A parasite being the source of a diseased brain has implications for treating mentally dysfunctional patients that may have a parasitic infection.
What McAuliffe’s book implies is the importance of washing one’s hands when handling pets, or their fecal material.
“This is Your Brain…” reminds one of the importance of hygiene when replenishing a bird feeder or filling an animal feeding trough to avoid possible parasites.
As most know, Kennedy is not a believer in vaccination despite a growing measles epidemic and the proof that vaccination works. McAuliffe does believe there are circumstances where a child crawling across the floor of a clean house gathers some immunity naturally but that un-common pathogens require uncommon vaccination.
Two other subjects mentioned by McAuliffe is natural and science made vaccinations and the benefits they provide humanity. This is a particularly timely suggestion considering Trump’s appointment of Robert F. Kennedy Jr. (a confessed anti-vaxxer) as the Secretary of Health and Human Services.
McAuliffe notes how research is showing how certain microbes can remove calories from food and how certain drugs can reduce hunger among overweight patients. She reflects on the intersection of microbiology and human health.
Another interesting examination by McAuliffe is the science research being done on gut microbiomes, a community of microorganisms in human digestive systems.
The research on microbiomes has resulted in effective weight loss drugs that have become popular medications for people struggling with weight gain.
“This is Your Brain on Parasites” is a bad book title but McAuliffe has written an interesting book about physical and mental health, and the treatments being researched in the 21st century.
REVIEWS AND VIEWS OF LIFE 