Is your crazy behaviour due to toxoplasmosis?

Hi,





I was very shocked by an article I read in The Economist June 5th 2010.
Toxoplasma gondii is a common parasite carried by cats and rats and mice. It is like Plasmodium that causes malaria in human beings. However Toxoplasma affects cats and rodents in its normal life cycle. However, if it gets into humans, it forms cysts in the brain, liver and muscles.

Its effects on the rodents is a bizarre and fatal attraction to cats! Infected rats have been shown to be attracted to the smell of cats. These rodents wander around the cat to draw attention towards them so that they will be eaten!!

In this way the parasite makes the rodent complete its life cycle.

Of course humans are not preys of cats. However when the parasites infects the brains of humans, it produces a number of strange and crazy problems.

(1)Schizophrenia is a form of severe mental problem or madness. Scientists in Johns Hopkins University proved that people who suffer from schizophrenia are 3 times more likely to be infected with toxoplasma.

(2)Scientists at Charles University in Prague proved that people involved in road accidents are 3 times more likely to be infected with toxoplasma. This is due to reduced reaction times and short attention spans of the drivers.

(3)Dopamine is a chemical molecule produced by nerve cells. It has psychotic effects. Infection with toxoplasma produces a reduction in "novelty-seeking" effect. When blood tests were conducted in different countries, the British had a infection score of only 6.6% and we all know that the Brits are calm and not easily excited (-0.8). On the other hand the French has a infection score of 45% and they are known to be outgoing and excitable.

As every science student is taught from the beginning, correlation is not causation. It could be that the symptoms are found to be more common amongst the susceptible or due to some third as yet unidentified variable.


Read more about this very ubiquitous creature at

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toxoplasma_gondii


Cheers