Figure 1. Parasite Cleanse Salon
If by this claim people mean that occult parasitic infection is the hidden cause of most sporadic cancers, and that deworming or antiparasitic “cleanses” should therefore be used as a general anticancer strategy, the evidence simply does not support it.
This is a persistent myth promoted among the public, some patients, and even certain doctors, who claim that parasites are a major cause of cancer. The idea collapses under even a basic understanding of parasitology, anatomy, histology, and pathological tissue examination. It is not supported by mainstream cancer biology, pathology, or infectious disease evidence.
Part of the confusion arises because some antiparasitic drugs — including ivermectin, mebendazole, fenbendazole, and niclosamide — have also shown anticancer effects in experimental or clinical contexts. But this does not mean that their anticancer activity is due to “killing hidden parasites.” That claim is false. The pathways through which these drugs affect parasites are entirely different from the pathways through which they may affect cancer cells. Their anticancer actions are pharmacologic and metabolic, not evidence of occult parasitism.
If you do not have a parasitic infection, parasite cleanses are absurd. They are equally absurd as a strategy to prevent cancer.
That said, parasites can cause specific cancers. But that is a very different claim from saying that parasites are the universal root cause of most or all cancers. A small number of helminths are firmly established human carcinogens. The clearest examples are:
Schistosoma haematobium → squamous cell carcinoma of the bladder, especially in endemic regions with urinary schistosomiasis
Opisthorchis viverrini → cholangiocarcinoma in Southeast Asia
Clonorchis sinensis → cholangiocarcinoma in East Asia
These are real, well-defined parasite–cancer associations. But they are geographically specific, biologically specific, and pathologically specific. They do not support the fantasy that most cancers are caused by hidden worms.
My colleague and friend Scott Marland, FNC-P, from the Leading Edge Clinic, has written an excellent Substack on this subject titled: “Parasite Schmarasite: Why the Worm Queen Trend Won’t Deworm Your Real Problems.”
Figure 1. H&E stain of a carcinoma
Figure 2. Tapeworm in small bowel
My husband is a survivor of an aggressive prostate cancer., which was diagnosed 8 years ago. The year before his diagnosis, it was discovered that he had a parasite and was treated effectively for it by his gastroenterologist. I’ve known my husband for over 60 years and I’ve never seen him sicker than during that period when the parasite was eliminated.
I’m not suggesting that the parasite caused his cancer but I believe that the parasite contributed to his body failing to adequately kill off the early cancer cells. My husband has always been extremely healthy, stable weight, exercises 4 times a week for 40 years and meditates daily for an hour, for the last 25 years. He’s the last person you’d expect to have an aggressive cancer.
Thank You, Dr. Marik.
“The Word is Not the Thing.”
A thing that treats a certain parasite and also a certain cancer, through different modes of action, does not link the parasite with the cancer.
Ivermectin is a very interesting molecule slightly modified from one found in microbes near a Japanese golf course in 1973.
It seems to have a lot of different modes of engagement with humans, bacteria, filarial worms, scabies and viruses, including COVID and some human cancers, but it is of most integral use to that bacterium, Streptomyces avermitilis.
RondUp has glyphosate, marketed as an herbicide, a “weed-killer”, but it is a really broad spectrum antimicrobial, killing many bacteria and fungi in the soils where it is applied, too. Most folks don’t know that. It’s the main thing it does, but not the Marketable thing it does.
Life’s complicated. Words are useful approximations most of the time, but thinking of them as absolutes leads to pitfalls.