Warning: Don't eat slugs

2003-10-19 11:34

Sydney - Australian doctors have issued a bizarre warning about eating slugs after a student contracted a potentially fatal brain disease when he swallowed some of the slimy gastropods for a dare.

Advising those with a taste for escargot to stick to reputable French restaurants, the medicos said there had been numerous cases of meningitis since 1971 caused by people eating garden snails or slugs.

One child died after eating snails and one patient contracted meningitis after eating lettuce covered with snail slime, a report in the Medical Journal of Australia due to be published Monday said.

Sydney University parasitologist John Walker said the most recent case was a Sydney student who ate two slugs from the garden as a dare for A$20 (US$13.80).

Walker, said tests found the man's meningitis was caused by a worm normally seen in rat lungs but carried as larvae in slugs and snails.

The worm caused the brain lining to swell, forcing doctors to drain fluid from inside the man's skull.

He was hospitalised for 17 days and it was five months before he could resume his studies.

Walker reported the man's friend also swallowed some slugs as part of the dare but promptly vomited them up, foregoing his A$20.

- AFP