Researchers in Type 1 Diabetes Worldwide Linked to the Advances in Medical Care

8 May

Researchers at the University of Adelaide, said in the case of type 1 diabetes, global growth is directly related to advances in medical care, and the disease is more likely to be through basic genetics from one generation to the next.
Researchers link global increase in type 1 diabetes to advances in medical care
Published in the British medical journal Diabetes Research and caring public paper, researchers looked at the prevalence of type 1 diabetes in 118 countries from 1950 to 2010 and changes in life expectancy.

After application of bio-metric data is referred to the state index, they found that the rapid increase in type 1 diabetes over the past few decades is in direct contact with people of average life expectancy, especially in Western countries – and therefore natural reduce choice.

“By the early 20th century, type 1 diabetes is a terrible and dangerous disease, usually in their teens or early twenties led to the death,” lead author Wenpeng your PhD at the University of Adelaide biological anthropology and Comparative Anatomy of said unit, Medical.

“This means that there is limited opportunity for people with the disease to have children, and by their genetic material to future generations. From an evolutionary point of view, this is what we call” natural selection. ”

“However, the widespread introduction of insulin from the 1920s, and improvements in modern medicine, the life expectancy of type 1 diabetes has now increased to about 69 years.

“This is a remarkable achievement, but it also means reducing natural selection, genetic material lead to the development of type 1 diabetes, can be quickly accumulated rate of the world population,” said Mr. You.

The researchers decided to investigate the link, because, although cases of type 1 diabetes has been increasing its prevalence in different parts of the world imbalances worldwide.

“Not every country to have access to good health care, or provide insulin free. In some poor countries, such as Africa, life expectancy is much lower than the Western world with type 1 diabetes, which means that more people are premature deaths , with less input to produce offspring who carry these genes from generation to generation opportunity, “said Mr. you.

Supervisors and co-author Professor Maciej Henneberg said: “Natural selection is an important evolutionary force, told to change our genes, one of the crowd and the whole generations.

“This is what we have shown that continue to accumulate, over time, due to the relaxation of natural selection first major disease. It is unlikely that this situation will never be reversed, which means that in order to overcome our country with type 1 diabetes population-related issues, some forms of gene therapy to repair the genetic defect may need to consider, “he said.