Farmer lived with tapeworm cysts for years before intense pain revealed illness

Meredydd Jones, an 86-year-old farmer from Trecastle, Wales, lived for years unaware he carried cysts caused by a tapeworm until a sudden, intense pain led to his diagnosis with hydatidosis. The condition, a significant public health issue particularly for sheep farmers, involves slow-growing cysts that can form in organs.

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I hadn't been able to control the pain, and it was more intense than anything I had ever felt before.

Jones recalls a night in May 2016 when excruciating pain, unlike anything he had felt before, necessitated an ambulance ride to Nevill Hall Hospital. Doctors suspected hydatidosis, a disease with a known presence in the region due to its sheep farming prevalence. "There was a lot of it in this area back then," Jones noted, recalling how the Ministry of Agriculture treated dogs on local farms.

Referred to a leading expert in London, Jones underwent two surgeries in 2018 and 2019 to remove cysts from both lungs. "I swapped two cysts for two scars," he remarked, though a cyst remains in his liver, which surgeons opted not to remove. He states living with the liver cyst does not bother him.

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I swapped two cysts for two scars on my ribs.

Public Health Wales describes hydatidosis as uncommon but a "significant public health problem" due to its potentially severe outcomes. The disease is caused by the Echinococcus granulosus tapeworm, which cycles between farm animals like sheep and dogs. Humans can contract the illness by ingesting the worm's eggs, often from dogs, leading to the formation of cysts that cause discomfort and require medical intervention.

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There was a lot of it in this area back then, and I remember the Ministry of Agriculture administering anti-parasitic treatments to dogs on local farms.