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Gene Found In Black Death Survivors Stops HIV
WindozeSux writes "According to research done by Dr. Stephen O'Brien, a mutated gene known as delta 32 found in Black Death survivor descendants, stops HIV in its tracks. In order to be immune both parents have to have the delta 32 gene. From the Article: 'In 1996, research showed that delta 32 prevents HIV from entering human cells and infecting the body. O'Brien thought this principle could be applied to the plague bacteria, which affects the body in a similar manner. To determine whether the Eyam plague survivors may have carried delta 32, O'Brien tested the DNA of their modern-day descendents...'"
of such discoveries is medicine made. now, the difficult part is going to be getting the experiments to prove it into the public eye, infecting "32" blood with HIV in vitro, and then taking that research into the luddite chambers of policymakers.
we'll have fun galore when that happens. a true righteous moral civil war.
if this is supposed to be a new economy, how come they still want my old fashioned money?
Well, until HIV becomes an airborne virus, not catching it in the first place is a pretty good way for 99% of the population to survive the epidemic...
AIDS so far is a social disease, which means certain behaviors minimize risk and certain behaviors maximize risk; unlike, say, the flu, which is both airborne, transmitted by contact, and through animals.
GPL Deconstructed
So what's stopping me from having science insert that gene into my offspring?
It still doesn't invalidate the rest of my comment that AIDS is a predominantly social disease; even in areas with 30% infection, the changing of social norms would make the remaining 70% of the population effectively immune:
1) Curtail sexual promiscuity
2) Practice protected sex
3) Encourage long term monogamy
All three of those things will render AIDS a harmless disease for 99% of the uninfected population.
A cure is necessary, of course, for the survival of the remaining infected population.
GPL Deconstructed
If we are speaking of old civilizations...then it seems pertinent to discuss the Romans...who were permiscuous as all hell...and were pretty damn successful. The religious aspect is bunk!
So 1950's...
1. Sex is *not* primarily for producing children... you'll produce a sprog maybe a couple of times in your life. You'll normally have sex at least a few times more than that (well maybe your church won't let you, but most people will). Sex is *fun*. Enjoy it while you're young.
2. There are plenty of healthy well adjusted people who are the children of unmarried parents. There are plenty of screwed up dickheads that are the children of married parents. Get with the late 20th century please at least... marriage is just a contract - if you really can't stay with someone without that then maybe you've not really found the right person. Marriage does *not* guarantee a lifelong relationship - there's a 50% divorce rate... fuelled by people like you who think that a bit of paper is a free pass to lifelong bliss - two people working hard at a relationship can do, and you don't need a contract for that.
They've even started banning shows that birds are appearing in, for fear of infecting the general population.
Idiots.
I feel like beating the editors with repeatedly with a cluebat. All the birds have *bird* flu. Not human flu. Humans are not birds. We do not have feathers, and cannot fly. Neither are we parrots. Which are also birds. Even dead parrots.
If/When the virus:
(a) jumps the species gap (which there's evidence it has done already a few times),
and (here's the kicker...) (b) the mutation can not only survive, but transfer to other human hosts (this hasn't happened yet) then there will be an issue.
Then it won't be bird flu any more. It'll be human flu.
Caveat to (b) - it may lose virulence in the tranfer, and end up just like all the other flu outbreaks that the press don't like to talk about because they're not scary enough, like 1967.
Oh, and (c) we know *just* a little bit more more about disease prevention than we did in 1918...
> Religion goes back as far as human history has been documented. Being that the basic tenants of religion build on each other, I often wonder if promiscuity is shunned in almost all of oldest civilizations because it comes from an implicit form of survival.
Given that some of the oldest known religions practiced temple prostitution, I think your otherwise interesting speculation may be based on a false premise.
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
This is the natural progression of evolution tho, those who have this gene are a step above the rest of us in the evolutionary scale.
I agree with the AC who also replied to this saying "There is no 'above' in the evolutionary scale. There is only the dead and the living (-and reproducing)."
It might be beneficial against HIV, but what if it has side-effects?
For example, the gene that helps defend against malaria (and is prevelant amongst many of African origin) is the same gene that causes sickle-cell anaemia. The benefit probably outweighs the problem, but it shouldn't be assumed that there is "better", "worse", "above" and so on.
People tend to view these things in a very short-term manner, when evolution is a long-term game.
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