Iowa woman swallows tapeworm to lose weight

People will do almost anything to lose weight. Just ask an Iowa woman, who apparently thought that ingesting a live tapeworm would be a good diet aid. That patient told her doctor that she had purchased a tapeworm on the Internet and swallowed it. The physician called the Iowa Department of Public Health to ask what to do for her. The department's medical director, Dr. Patricia Quinlisk, advised an anti-worm medication. Quinlisk recounted the incident Thursday in a weekly e-mail to public health workers around the state. She noted that websites have been selling tapeworms as a weight-loss tool and warned against the practice. http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2013/08/16/tapeworm-weight-loss-scam/2666005/