How to avoid ‘parasitic mind control’ disease related to cats

MISSOULA — It’s something many of us have never heard of before, but many of us have the untreatable disease without ever knowing it.

Reporter Brin Merkley with KPAX in Missoula, Montana went on special assignment to find out about a mind controlling parasite that can’t live without a cat, how it manipulates personality – and possibly suicide numbers.

Parasitic mind control sounds like the stuff of sci-fi television – but it’s real! The parasite is called Toxoplasma gondii, and according to the Centers for Disease Control, more than 60 million people in the U.S. may be carrying it.

The parasite has been shown to cause personality changes, correlating with mental health diseases like schizophrenia, autism and Alzheimer’s disease.

University of Montana Microbiology Professor Bill Granath says some studies have also found women to be more prone to suicide.

“It’s a very insidious, some of the studies that you can read, how the parasite can attack certain nerves and manipulate various neurotransmitters and cause various mental illnesses. I guess you’d call it…altered states,” he explained.

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