Hey there. Yeah, you. You think you are all that? That you are all 100% man (or woman)? Well, guess again, my friend.

Turns out you are only 43% of that!

A recent biological study reports that human cells on;y make up 43% of our body’s total cell count. The rest….well…a bunch of other junk like bacteria, viruses, fungi, and other ‘colonists’.

According to scientists, this insight is interesting and can be a gateway into finding out more treatments and cures for diseases and viruses. “We don’t have just one genome, the genes of our microbiome present essentially a second genome which augment the activity of our own”, says some guy at CalTech. Again, this way of looking at the human body may be good news on the medicine front.

But there is another side to this; it is very creepy.

Sure, researchers may be unlocking the mysteries of the human anatomy, the symbiotic nature between native and foreign cells, and even the complexities of life itself. But none of these benefits, not one of them, addressing the issue of the disgusting and overall eerie feeling I get when I think about it.

I don’t want to be a incubator for small gross things, feeding off what I eat, occupying various parts of my body uninvited, and all rent free no less! Doesn’t sound very fair to me.

Another issue how this <50% human thing can also alter criminal charges. I mean did OJ really ‘kill’ two people, or maybe just 86% of one human? Did Jeffery Dahmer really ‘eat’ 17 people, or maybe he ate 9.69 human’s-worth of microbes? Things to think about, huh?

I know this parasitic relationship between human and those little guys has some benefit. They help us ward off other diseases, aid us in digestion, maybe can be used to advance medications, and can keep us company on lonely nights. But overall, I find this discovery very creepy, confusing, and all around weird.

Excuse me while I try to wash off all of these gross things from my body. Maybe I can get up to 45% human.