Just like steak, when it comes to bacon, everyone has their own preferences. Oven cooked, fried, extra-crispy, soft, etc.
However, it’s recently been revealed that when it comes to bacon, your taste preferences aren’t all that matters.
This is because, over in the states, a-52-year old man who complained of repeated migraines, was actually found to have tapeworm larvae in his brain that was eventually linked to uncooked bacon.
Great.
How undercooked bacon created tapeworm larvae
Though the man had suffered with migraines previously, his usual medication wasn’t helping anymore and doctors sent him for scans, where he was found to have tapeworm larval cysts in his brain, which causes cysticercosis.
According to the BBC, Cysticercosis is a type of infection caused by the larvae of the parasite Taenia solium (T.solium), also known as pork tapeworm, which can lead to cysts (cysticerci) developing in the brain.
Someone with a tapeworm can infect themselves with tapeworm eggs - a process known as autoinfection - which can pass out of the body as waste and infect others in the same home.
Doctors put the condition down to “improper handwashing”. They believe the man, who got a tapeworm from eating underdone pork, infected himself.
Experts say eating undercooked pork cannot give you cysticercosis - nor is the condition common in the US, or the UK, where pig meat undergoes rigorous testing.
The highest rates of the condition are found in parts of Latin America, Asia and Africa, and it is most common in rural areas where pigs are allowed to roam freely, and hygiene and food safety practices are poor.
People are most at risk from infections like this through poor hand washing or by ingesting contaminated food or water.
The authors of the report concluded: “It is very rare for patients to contract neurocysticercosis outside of classic exposures or travel, and such cases in the United States were thought to be non-existent.”
I’ll still be having my bacon crispy with a side of thoroughly washed hands, tbh.