So Australian teenager Sam Ballard grabbed the slimy creature and gulped it down. He had no idea that the slug carried a potentially deadly worm that would put him into a coma that lasted more than a year, paralyze his body and ultimately take his life.
In 2010, 19-year-old Sam, an avid rugby player, was drinking with Jimmy Galvin and several more of his Australian "mates" when a slug began crawling across Galvin's concrete patio at his home in Sydney.
"We were sitting over here, having a bit of red wine appreciation night, trying to act as grown-ups," Galvin recalled in a video interview this year with Lisa Wilkinson of "The Sunday Project," a current affairs talk show that airs on Network 10 in Australia. CNN reached out to Galvin but has not heard back.
"And then the conversation came up, 'Should I eat it?' " recalled Galvin. "And then off Sam went and bang, that's how it happened."
After downing the slug, Sam became weak and complained of severe pain in his legs, according to "The Sunday Project." Sam's mother, Katie Ballard, told the news show that at first they worried he might have multiple sclerosis, which had afflicted her husband. But doctors said no, that wasn't the cause.
Then Sam turned to his mother and told her he had eaten a slug, "And I went, 'No, no one gets sick from that,' " Katie Ballard said. CNN has also reached out to Ballard.
Soon, however, doctors told them otherwise. Sam had developed rat lungworm disease from the infected slug, changing his life forever.
In 2010, 19-year-old Sam, an avid rugby player, was drinking with Jimmy Galvin and several more of his Australian "mates" when a slug began crawling across Galvin's concrete patio at his home in Sydney.
"We were sitting over here, having a bit of red wine appreciation night, trying to act as grown-ups," Galvin recalled in a video interview this year with Lisa Wilkinson of "The Sunday Project," a current affairs talk show that airs on Network 10 in Australia. CNN reached out to Galvin but has not heard back.
"And then the conversation came up, 'Should I eat it?' " recalled Galvin. "And then off Sam went and bang, that's how it happened."
After downing the slug, Sam became weak and complained of severe pain in his legs, according to "The Sunday Project." Sam's mother, Katie Ballard, told the news show that at first they worried he might have multiple sclerosis, which had afflicted her husband. But doctors said no, that wasn't the cause.
Then Sam turned to his mother and told her he had eaten a slug, "And I went, 'No, no one gets sick from that,' " Katie Ballard said. CNN has also reached out to Ballard.
Soon, however, doctors told them otherwise. Sam had developed rat lungworm disease from the infected slug, changing his life forever.
