Scientists have been studying an 87 year old who is reportedly healthy despite not washing for almost seven decades, only eating roadkill raw and drinking dirty water from puddles.

Researchers carried out tests on Amou Haji who gave up washing 67 years ago after becoming convinced that it would bring him bad luck, and eventually kill him.

Ever since then he found it difficult to make friends, and even harder to find a girlfriend, made all the more difficult by the fact that he smokes a pipe filled with animal manure and his favourite meal is roadkill porcupine – uncooked.

Despite his lifestyle, visitors have been amazed at his understanding of world events, and reported how they discussed the Russian revolution with him and other significant historical events.

He eventually resigned himself to a solitary life but was amazed when villagers impressed at his dedication to his lifestyle decided to build him a shack to live in. Until that point, it actually lived in a hole in the ground and despite all that, is amazingly healthy his age.

He has also in the meantime been visited at his rundown shack in Dejgah village in the southern province of Fars in Iran, by medics who carried out tests to find that only have no unhealthy bacteria or serious diseases, but that he was also surprisingly healthy.

Experts were interested in studying what type of lifeforms including parasites might have taken up home on his body and were able to confirm that he doesn’t have any disease or any parasites, despite the lack of personal hygiene.

There also surprised that he had not suffered from his preference for eating decaying meat again because of his superstitions, and refusing to sterilise the warty drinks.

Surprisingly given his remote lifestyle, he is well educated and one recent visit discussed the pros and cons of the French Revolution and also his views on how well the Russian Revolution turned out for the people.

He knew the up-to-date politicians but also complain that the international publicity had made life difficult for him, and although his neighbours respect him, he said people turn up occasionally to taunt him, and even throw stones at him.

The local governor has appealed for people to leave him alone, saying that despite his appearance he’s a gentle soul and never boring to meet and talk to.

The tests were carried out by an associate professor of parasitology at the School of Public Health in Teheran by team including Dr Gholamreza Molavi.

The medic said that given the enormously unsanitary conditions in which he lives surrounded by waste and dead animals, the anyway could have remained so healthy as by developing an enormously strong immune system.

He added that they had tested him for everything through from the various forms of hepatitis and AIDS through to parasites, and the only thing that they found was a Trichinosis infection which is a parasitic infection which in his case appeared to be producing no symptoms.

Larvae hatch out when uncooked meat is eaten typically from bears or dogs, but not pork in his case as his religion does not allow him to eat pig.

After a week larvae emerge which then burrow into the nearby muscles to form small cysts. They then remain dormant typically for the life of the host waiting for the time when the host dies, in anticipation of being eaten again and restarting the process.