Featured Image Credit: NATALIA KOLESNIKOVA / Contributor / Getty
We have enough to worry about with concerns about global warming burning us off the face of the planet, an AI uprising bringing the Terminator movies to life, and one of the world's many power-trip political leaders nuking us into oblivion, but adding to this, we should now be worrying about the food that we eat.
HBO's The Last of Us showed us a harrowing timeline where flour turned humanity into mushroom monsters, and while that's just fiction, there are some real-life dangers thanks to what we consume.
Having previously covered how keeping cooked rice in your fridge can turn it toxic, and why some foods should be kept away from the freezer, we're now being warned about what eating uncooked pork can do to our health.
We already know that air fryers can unexpectedly lead to undercooked pork, and even though overcooked meats can give an increased risk of cancer, you'll want to think twice about how you cook after seeing this 'nauseating' scan.
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Doctor Sam Ghali has shared a CT scan on X, showing the unexpected sight of someone's lower half sporting a series of unusual dark spots.
Ghali says this is one of the most 'insane' scans he's ever seen, explaining how the shot of the pelvis displays 'linear densities' that are actually a sign of cysticercosis.
The spots are actually larval sacks of Taenia solium, which is known best as the pork tapeworm. This life cycle begins when a human consumes raw or undercooked pork, leading to them getting an infected gastrointestinal tract and passing this on to other humans.
Ghali warns that these cysts can travel anywhere in the body, so although this lucky patient only appears to have them in the legs, others are known to have been infected in the brain.
In an area like the legs, pork tapeworms don't cause much of an issue, with the initial scan only being taken because they'd fallen and injured their hip.
The cysts tend to harden over time, leading to what we know as 'rice grain calcification'. He reminds us that the real problem happens if the Taenia solium makes it to the brain and calcifies there.
It's one of the most insane X-Rays I've ever seen. Here's a video I made breaking it down.
— Sam Ghali, M.D. (@EM_RESUS) November 24, 2025
Tell all your friends about this https://t.co/Jp8ZB8keNN pic.twitter.com/Z7NjJOqgwz
Neurocysticercosis can cause seizures and even be deadly if not treated. The real problem is that neurocysticercosis is referred to as the 'great imitator' because it can mimic numerous other neurological disorders.
Ghali says that the moral of the story is to always do your best to keep clean, wash your hands, and never (under any circumstances) eat raw or undercooked pork.
With a new fear unlocked, one person replied to the video saying: "See that’s why I don’t eat that nasty undercooked bacon they have. In other countries, UK, Canada, Japan, none of the places I've been to make crispy bacon outside of US."
Another added: "I'm just going to act like I didn’t just eat slightly undercooked pork belly the other day."
A third said: "Omg, I literally just finished eating bacon!! 🥓🫣."
