well it's also a function of the body's immune reaction to it. there is no specific worm which causes elephantiasis (there's about twenty that can), each elicits different reactions in the body.
it's also interesting to know that the disease that plagued Joseph Merrick (the "Elephant Man" for which elephantiasis was named) was NOT elephantiasis but actually a much rarer congenital defect called Protean syndrome (of which there have been possibly 200 cases worldwide).
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