It turns out that the famous "Elephant Man" did not, in fact,
actually have elephantiasis, the disease characterized by acute swelling
of the limbs and caused most often by a parasitic worm transmitted by
mosquitoes.
What the elephant man did have was
some of the classic elephantiasis symptoms, and those aren't pretty. In
fact, they're pretty ugly.
The parasitic worms that cause
elephantiasis hang out in the lymph system, which controls the immune
response and fluid retention — hence the swelling. That swelling most
often occurs in the legs, but it can also affect the arms, breasts or
even the genitals, causing them to swell and deform to enormous sizes.
Don't get the wrong idea, guys: in
men, the scrotum can swell so much that the penis can retract inside the
swollen, thickened skin. Now, that just sounds unpleasant.
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