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The Dangers of Research...
Feb. 4th, 2014 03:25 pmThere you are, researching when humans figured out that iron was in our blood, and you stumble onto genetic questions about why one population has more occurrences of a genetic condition than others. And you lose the time it takes to read the article. If you're inspired to keep going, oh, the time lost!
There must be an explanation for why hereditary hemochromatosis is 30 times less common in blacks and 11,000 times less common in Asians than in non-Hispanic whites. A founder effect, the relatively young age of the mutation, and other unidentified demographic factors may explain this discrepancy. And perhaps, the allele may have discouraged iron deficiency or disease at a particularly vulnerable time in northern Europe.
The why is so important, as it raises fundamental questions regarding our own future.
There must be an explanation for why hereditary hemochromatosis is 30 times less common in blacks and 11,000 times less common in Asians than in non-Hispanic whites. A founder effect, the relatively young age of the mutation, and other unidentified demographic factors may explain this discrepancy. And perhaps, the allele may have discouraged iron deficiency or disease at a particularly vulnerable time in northern Europe.
The why is so important, as it raises fundamental questions regarding our own future.
