We have kept this short on purpose. When you want the full depth — the trials, the dosing, the community, the arguments — here is where to find it.
If you have read this far and want to go further, these four are the most useful first steps.
The science behind this site rests on a small number of people — a few researchers, and one extraordinarily determined patient.
Immunologist who named the 'old friends' hypothesis — the more specific claim that the immune system doesn't miss cleanliness in general, but the particular organisms it co-evolved with over hundreds of thousands of years.
Gastroenterologist who ran the first modern clinical trials of pig whipworm (TSO) in inflammatory bowel disease, noticing how rare IBD was in regions where intestinal parasites remained common.
Immunologist who conducted the first controlled hookworm trials in the UK. To establish safety, he infected himself — a tradition of careful self-experimentation the patient community has continued.
Biophysicist who compiled the most rigorous sociomedical dataset of self-treaters and named the concept of 'biota alteration' — the immune dysfunction that follows the systematic removal of symbiotic organisms from modern life. His work argues that remaining helminth-free is not a neutral choice.
A man with intractable asthma who sought out hookworm in 2005 after reading Pritchard's work, becoming the movement's most visible early advocate and building the patient community that now numbers in the thousands.
Everything here lives on the community wiki — maintained by volunteers, kept current, and free.
The most recent framework paper: how the systematic loss of symbiotic organisms through modern sanitation — what Parker calls 'biota alteration' — drives the modern epidemic of chronic immune disorders, and why pharmaceutical approaches alone cannot address it.
Uses divergent COVID-19 outcomes between high- and low-income populations to argue for 'biome reconstitution' as a public health strategy — showing that the loss of helminthic symbiosis leaves the immune system ill-prepared for both chronic inflammation and acute infection.
Distinguishes 'personal hygiene' (handwashing, distancing) from 'systems hygiene' (sewage, water treatment) — arguing only the latter depletes the immune biome, and that controlled helminth exposure could restore it without sacrificing protection against infectious disease.