Ewwww bugs! 

I know, I know, that’s just the natural instinct for us girly-girls.

Unfortunately, this is one of the many unpleasantries we may encounter should we find ourselves in a catastrophic situation where pour sanitation is found.

Parasites; contrary to popular belief, are not past boyfriends (although it would be hard to beg to differ with some of you), but are highly developed forms of life. These little beasties live off their hosts because they cannot provide their own sustenance and food.

What??? 

Okay, they are tiny little bugs that latch on to our bodies and feed on us. 

Better?

I'm sure you've heard of some of these little latchers before; tapeworms, roundworms, hookworms, lice, chiggers, fleas, and ticks, just to name a few (both internal and external parasites.)

Parasites can compromise our immune systems as well as our physical, mental, and emotional well-being.

In a survival situation where there is little or no water and poor sanitation, there will be numerous ways you can develop a parasitic infection. 

Some of the many ways, and just the tip of the ice berg mind you are by drinking water contaminated with fecal material, having contact with contaminated water on your skin, eating food without proper washing it, being bitten by blood sucking insects that transmit infectious agents, developing an air borne virus, bacteria, or fungi., through our pets or a stray that may be carrying an intestinal tapeworm, by people through close human-to-human contact and, in by walking bare-footed or sitting in fecally contaminated soil.

As you can see … there are just normal every day events.  Without water and with poor sanitation our chances to developing a parasite infection is greatly increased!

You can reduce your chance of infection by washing your hands thoroughly and maintaining as sanitary an environment as you can with what you have to work with.  As you know, with no running water and no electricity this becomes a daunting task in and of its self.   The steps above won't eliminate the possibility of infections but will greatly reduce them.  So, make sure to stock up on anti-parasiticals, hand and spray sanitizers!

Some of the many are herbs and spices to discourage rather than killing the parasites,  that were used in days-gone-by are; garlic, goldenseal, black walnut, wormwood, (sounds like a parasite in and of itself!) (of note: the pure wormwood oil is considered toxic and should not be ingested), wormseed, pumpkin seeds, grapefruit seed extract, and tumeric and cloves.

You can also protect yourself by eating anit-parasitic foods such as raw garlic (heck if it can keep a vampire away it most assuredly can fight off a bug huh?).  Pineapple (although not sure how you would come about that – possibly capsule form) can help to clear certain parasites such as the tapeworm, as does papaya seeds.

Don’t forget to take your vitamins! Vitamin A is thought to increase resistance to penetration by larvae (those are baby parasites - for the record). Vitamin C and zinc also support the immune system therefore eating foods rich in beta carotene such as carrots, sweet potatoes and squash again, can help find infection.

Scary as all of this sounds, should you come down with a parasitic infection try avoiding coffee, refined sugar, alcohol and refined foods temporarily (if they are even available to us), and eat a diet high in fiber which will help support the intestinal parasite cleansing process. 

In a survival situation, parasites may not be an ‘if’ situation but a ‘when” situation. Do your research and start stocking up on helpful herbs and spices (that take up little to no space).

Tell me Grand Ma didn't know what she was talking about with all her herb remedies!

- Survivor Jane
 

Thank you for sharing Survivor Jane with all of your Friends!

If you liked this ... then you will love my book, "Emergency/Survival Hygiene: A Prepper "Cookbook" for Survival Personal Hygiene Products", "What Could Possibly Go Wrong??? How to Go From Completely Clueless to Totally Prepared" and my NEW Book "Puzzling Over Preparedness - Survivor Jane's Prepper Word Search Puzzles"