Why Huntington's Disease May Take So Long To Develop
Huntington's disease - Symptoms and causes - Mayo Clinic
By: Tina Hesman Saey
After reading this article discusses how Huntington's disease takes a long time to develop. HTT is the mistakenly repeated gene that brings forth Huntington's disease. According to Mayo Clinic, Huntington's disease is a rare, inherited disease that causes the progressive breakdown of nerve cells in the brain. Huntington's disease causes cognitive, movement, and psychiatric disorders. Preventing the repetition of the HTT gene can stop the disease from growing. 41,000 people in the U.S. have Huntington's disease and 200,000 people are at risk of having that condition. I found this shocking that a large number of Americans suffer from this illness. I learned that people who have more than 40 repeats are at risk of obtaining Huntington's disease rather than a person having 26 or fewer repeats. This disease is very fatal because it can potentially cause paralysis or death due to heart failure. I believe that this article was very educational and increased my knowledge of Huntington's Disease and how it can develop.
This is interesting and I wonder if there could be a way to cut out the repetitive sequences in a patient before they develop the disease, so they don't get it. But...I don't think that's ethical and nor do I think we have the technology to do that yet.
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