GUINEA-WORM. A parasitic roundworm (q.v.) (Dracuneulus Medinensis), especiallyehar acteristic of the central and eastern parts of Arabia, but abundant in India, Persia, Nubia, the swampy regions of the White Nile, and Guinea, and found widely distributed in the warmer parts of both hemispheres. Sailors have been known to bring them into New England ports. The adult worm is whitish in color and only one or two millimeters in thickness, although it is some times a meter in length. The eggs are laid in water, but the young only reach maturity in the human body, where they come to lie under the skin, in the connective tissue, especially of the extremities, often producing painful sores, and causing the disease filariasis (or dracon tiasis), which is accompanied by emaciation and debility. The female is viviparous, while the male is unknown. Carter regards a small worm (Urolabes palustris), frequenting brackish waters, as the immature form of the guinea-worm.
It is also believed that the embryos enter the bodies of water-fleas ( Cyclops, etc.) , and there molt, and that consequently they may be intro duced into the body by drinking standing water; but this has not been proved. Other species of Filaria occur in the tropies,oneof which (Filaria sanguinis-hontini.$) is said to be the cause of the disease elephantiasis (q.v.). This is a worm of microscopic size, found living in the blood of the mosquito in India and China. It is said that the eggs are swallowed in the water drunk by man, are hatched in his intestines and obstruct the smaller blood-vessels, thus causing the dis ease named, and perhaps even leprosy. Other species of Filaria live in the p'ritoneum of the horse and of apes, and au immature form (1'11aria lent is) has been detected in the lens of the human eye.