The Creepy Truth Behind 10 Urban Myths

The Legend

A holidaymaker comes back from their travels to some exotic destination. They notice something like a bite or a swelling and think nothing of it ... until the it begins to wriggle. One day, the swelling ruptures and a nightmarish beastie bursts forth in a horrifying Alien-esque birth scene.

The Truth

There are all sorts of horrible creepy crawlies out there that have a life cycle which includes laying something under the skin of a poor, unsuspecting human.

In 2007, a man from Colorado named Aaron Dallas was suffering from an itchy scalp that all of the Head and Shoulders in the world couldn't fix. Then, one day, the itching became an excruciating pain that brought him to his knees. Dallas reports that it was at this point that he could actually hear whatever it was that was pupating under his skin. He went to his doctor who cut open his scalp and discovered a little nest of Botfly larvae that had made their home there.

In another skin-crawling account of parasitic freeloading, x-rays recently surfaced on the internet purporting to show a body of a sushi lover that was riddled with tapeworms. These turned out to be a hoax, but not in a good way.

Whilst it isn't true that the worms were caused by eating sushi (yay), they were actually caused by eating a much more common meat such as pork or beef (boo). You can see the x-rays here, but be warned that they will make you want to claw your own skin off.