Researchers Discover the First 'Heart Attack' Gene

jimi1283 writes "A group of researchers recently conducted a study on 100 members of a family that had a high percentage of heart attack and other coronary disease. The study lead to the discovery of the gene responsible."

Comments

Never a single gene

[maddu]

There is never *one* gene that causes a particular problem. Multiple genes are responsible almost always. Something as common as a heart attack will have multiple causes.

Re:Never a single gene

[Smidge204]

From the article you probably didn't read:

The gene makes a protein that regulates some other genes and Topol said those will now be analyzed to see if they can be linked generally to heart disease.

So no, it's probably not just that gene, but in general it seems the problem starts from here and cascades down.

I'm not a biologist, but I think until they've mapped out every single gene and know exactly what it does, it might be wise to refain from words like "never" and "always". :)
=Smidge=

Gene knowledge has an ugly impact on ethics

[G4from128k]

Ethics and public policty really can't handle this type of knowledge on who can get what disease after exposure to common environmental factors or habits. Current health policy standards and EPA guidelines assume that "all people are created equal." Thus, the EPA sets carcinogen levels to create a less than one-in-a-million chance of getting cancer. But what happens now that we know that we are not all created equal -- instead of everyone having a one-in-a-million chance, we have 999,999 people with no chance of cancer and 1 genetically identifiable person per million with a 100% chance of cancer.

The existence of distinct genetic susceptabilities to high-fat foods, smoking, carcinogens, medications, etc. makes it hard to create uniform regulations for food, medicine, and occupational conditions.

Heart attack gene and lifestyle

[XenonChloride]

Whoever isn't really satisfied with the information given in the CNN article might want to have a look at the Heart News, where Eric Topol points out:

People with this exact MEF2A mutation have essentially a 100-percent chance of having a heart attack or developing coronary artery disease [...] For people without a genetic predisposition, they must make it their responsibility to take care of themselves to prevent heart disease from developing.

So for all the obese guys out there:
Think about some other famous last words than It is all genetic [...]