Disease Blog 9

The chapter talks about how blood variations maybe play a part in the variations of mutations. Chromsome 9 determines various blood types. Blood grouping is considered to be, " the friend of the innocent." (136) The chapter talks about the ABO system which was first discovered in the 1900s. "A and B are 'co-dominant' versions of the same gene, O being 'the recessive' form of it" (137) The chapter also mentions malaria in which type O blood types are much more resistant than other blood types. They are also less likely to develop different variations of cancer. This is because its survival instinct had gone up enough to keep it from disappearing. The issue of disease and mutations linkage is also mentioned with the example of sickle cell anemia occurring in Africa. The frequency of this disease is believed to be in relation to malaria. In the sickle cell mutation, it is recalled that, "blood cells collapse in the absence of oxygen, [and] is frequently fatal to those with two copies of it." (141) Resistants to malaria is with those who have one copy.