‘Teaching cordyceps to consume human tissue, what could go wrong?’
A TikToker has got people worried that we could see The Last Of Us in real life after he grew his own cordyceps and ate it.
Earlier this year, the hit apocalyptic video game was turned into a HBO series starring Pedro Pascal and Bella Ramsey. Just like the game, the show received rave reviews and is easily one of the best television series of 2023.
But the show reached a whole new level of scary for some when they realised that cordyceps – the deadly fungus that turns those infected into monstrous, zombie-like creatures – is also a real-world fungus.
In the real-world, cordyceps manages to control small insects and effectively turn them into puppets.
The fungus takes the insect to a high spot in a forest and then bite down on a plant, before the fungus consumes everything inside its host.
The high position then allows the fungus to spread across the forest and infect more insects.
Now, TikToker and fungus expert Jacob Riley Hood has decided to grow his own cordyceps fungus, using his own blood and skin.
Cordyceps cannot infect humans due to our impressive immune systems, but Hood’s actions have still got people worried.
In his TikTok, Hood explained that the cordcyeps fungus has been growing using his blood, dead skin, and rice.
After having a look at the fungus under a microscope, he then inexplicably decides that the next logical step is to taste some of the fungus.
Even more concerningly, he says it tasted sweet and that he’d do it again.
He said: “This cordyceps was grown using me so uh let’s see if it tastes good.
After a few seconds and chews, he says: “I’m not going to swallow it, but it is strangely sweet and it is pretty good, I would eat it again.
“I would be interested to see how it taste compared to normal grown cordyceps.”
Commenting on the video, one person said: “Teaching cordyceps to consume human tissue, what could go wrong?”
Another said: “So cordyceps could actually have a small chance of taking over the world.”
A third joked: “We know who will be patient zero then.”
And someone else commented: “Hey man, I just watched the last of us, don’t do this to me!”
Hood did make a follow-up video in which he assured people the fungus he had grown was a commercially available version of cordyceps which is commonly used as a supplement.
He explained that the human immune system and our high body temperature make it ‘extremely improbable’ for the fungus to infect a living human.
Related links:
61-year-old man dies after being infected by killer plant fungus
