Parasitic worms(aka helminths ) are not the most pleasant thing to think of   –   these organisms have blight humans throughout account , slithering inside our body , exploiting their hosts and draining resources . In current - day Europe and North America , contagion with these creatures is thankfully rare and is typically found in travelers run short into endemic areas ,   typically tropical and subtropical regions . Helminth infections are classed as one of the top overlook tropic diseases by theWorld Health Organization(WHO ) .

This oddment has not always been the case , and many archaeologicalstudieshave found the eggs of these helminths in Europe and North America . These eggs are typically environmentally resilient and can remain morphologically identifiable for hundreds of year .

Interestingly enough , the detection of eggs can provide insight into the social office of the   inauspicious septic someone . For object lesson , infection of dirt ball transmitted by the faecal - oral path ( such as the ringworm , Ascaris , and the whipworm , Trichuris ) , may suggest   poor sanitation and hygienics practices . On the other hand , some tapeworms are transmitted by undercooked solid food like red kernel ( Taeniaspp . ) and freshwater fish ( Diphyllobothrium latum , syn . Dibothriocephalus latus ) .

As you could ideate , the best property to line up the fecal - associated worm are inancient toilets , communal deposit , and the abdominal neighborhood of mummified or skeletal remains . The latter sampling type is the most challenging to win but is often the most informative , as they can be combined with single feature like eld and gender .

research worker psychoanalyse the prevalence rates of helminth infections from the Prehistoric to the Industrial era , and how this charge per unit changed over time , describing their findings in thePLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases .

Scientists examine soil samples from the abdominal area of 464 individual gaunt clay swallow up at 17 sites around the UK , finding that over a quarter of the samples had helminth infestations .

But which time period was the most inundate with these leechlike devil ?

While they detected contagion across all time period , the high-pitched was in … drum roll … popish and Late - Medieval period .

The Romans may be a surprising result to some ( the late - medieval period not so much ) , as the ancient Romans were known for the introduction of large multi - seat public latrine , clean water , toilet , and aqueducts . Modern researchhas designate that memory access to clean drinking water and toilets help to decrease GI infection of parasites .

However , this work and previousstudiesindicate that the Roman sanitation technology may not have been the parasitic contraceptive we once thought . This may have been because human wastefulness from the public latrine was used to fertilize crops infields , and contaminated food intersection could have reinfected population .

The sketch also highlighted another interesting time flow : the industrial age . The scientists discovered that two of the three sites contained very few ( or no ) parasites , but the London site contain very high levels of infection – as may be wait in a cramp urban arena with poor sanitation . The downcast charge per unit in the other two sites , Oxford and Birmingham , may be because of blank well - based water supply access .

fortuitously for current UK citizen , most fecal - concentrate worms are no longer endemic , and this may be due to amend sanitisation in the 19thand former 20thcenturies and the development of modern parasiticidal drug .

Whilst these results should be taken with a grain of salt – as the preponderance rates may have been an underestimated due to the taphonomic ( how being decay and become fossilize ) method or sample processing – this enquiry is important and by looking into the past , scientists can come up with agency of handle sponge without toilsome drug intercession .