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What Can Increase My Risk for Parasitic Infections?

What Can Increase My Risk for Parasitic Infections? (0:44)

Your risk for parasitic infections goes up when you travel, when you eat certain imported foods, when you don't wash your hands, or if you have pets who are carriers. Watch integrative medicine expert Tasneem Bhatia, MD, explain these risk factors.

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There are a number of different factors that play into getting a parasite, the most obvious, I think, are travel. You've taken a vacation to somewhere exotic, you've moved around in different parts of the world, that's a risk of getting a parasite. After that, sometimes it's not necessarily travel, it can simply be the food you're eating. We now know that our meat is often coming from different areas of the world, our produce is often coming from different areas of the world, or is not handled properly, so meat and produce can pose a risk of getting a parasite infection.

Hand washing, or failure to hand wash is another common way to transmit parasites. And finally, animals. Pets carry parasites, oftentimes, they will pass it to their host, and that's another way of getting a parasitic infection.