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News Feature
Nature 432, 10-11 (4 November 2004) | doi:10.1038/432010a; Published online 3 November 2004
Medicinal leeches: Stuck on you
Helen Pilcher1
- Helen Pilcher is a reporter for Email: news@nature.com.
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Abstract
Recent studies are pointing the way for new uses of an ancient treatment — leeches. Helen Pilcher wades in to find out how these creatures could help the arthritic.
They've got three jaws, with some 300 teeth, and they like to feast on human blood. "I've only been bitten around 20 times," says Carl Peters as he plunges his hand into a tank of swirling, hungry leeches.
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