Leprosy Genes

Edward Glamkowski writes "Science Daily (among others) has an article about host genes that make people vulnerable to leprosy. Appearently the disease still affects over one million people in 91 countries today. "This is the second study, published in 2003 by McGill/CGDN scientists, that illustrates the importance of host genes in infectious disease." Appearently they did a study on Legionnaire's disease as well and plan on studying malaria and TB."

Hansen's disease?

[alwayslurking]

I got the impression that researchers had stopped using "leprosy" to describe the condition because of the negative connotations amongst the general public. Certainly, you hear a lot more about Hansen's disease in the British media.

The Science Daily article refers to leprosy throughout though, suggesting that North America stills prefer that nomenclature. Is this some kind of accreditation thing, akin to Farnsworth and Baird?

Re:Hansen's disease?

[aneiken]

I think that is just everyone here in the states recognizes leprosy and wont necasarially know what hansens's disease is since leporsy has gone a long ways back.( being that it is in the bible)

Re:Hansen's disease?

[dacarr]

Think of the connotations though. You say "Hansen's disease" and many of the current generation here in the US of A who has no medical training is likely to think of a bunch of kids that made top 40 radio about 6 or 7 years ago, or perhaps a brand of carbonated beverage or juice, rather than look for the reference in a dictionary. Or at least, that's what the US media would have you believing.

It's a word!

[cornjchob]

Leprosy is a word. That's it. If someone wants to have their own connotation (good or bad), leave them be. People aren't "Differently Abled", people are handicapped or retarded. That's it. By the same token, people don't have "Hansen's Disease", they have Leprosy. They don't mean bad things--it's the people that make them bad. Softening words leads to softer people, and adding syllables doesn't always make the situation better.

Leprosy v. Hansen's Disease: its all just PC Bunk

[FreeUser]

The Science Daily article refers to leprosy throughout though, suggesting that North America stills prefer that nomenclature. Is this some kind of accreditation thing, akin to Farnsworth and Baird?

In other news, America continues to call a Spade a Spade, while still being unable with the next breath to refer to a crippled man as handicaped but rather "differently abled." Meanwhile Europe calls a software monopolist a software monopolist, but is unable to utter the word "leprosy", instead opting for more obfuscated and thusly less potent term, "Hansen's Disease."

I have grown to loath the political correctness of both America and Europe (which are very different from one another, by the way, yet equally obnoxious and quite toxic to clear, independent thought). I dislike dogma, and especially the kind of dancing around the facts that PC language implicity requires ... and I say this as one who supports feminism, is a devout believer in the inherent social and legal equality of all people, indeed, a supporter of the vast majority of points so-called PC language attempts to promote through a newspeak style shaping of social discourse.

The approach is wrong and disingenuous, and it is time we got rid of it. Hansen's disease indeed. Feh. It is leprosy, with all that that implies.

Ironically native Americans I met when visiting Navaho Nation still call themselves "Indians" (and expect you to as well), despite the apparent reluctance on the part of the rest of the country (sports fans excepted) to use the term. "Native American" is one of the few PC terms I actually agree with, as it removes ambiguity from the language and offers a real improvement. African American vs. Black on the other hand is merely another in a series of disposable words, like "colored" and "negro", two once entirely respectful words which, just as African American will someday be, have been discarded on the scrap heap of "no longer accepted terms we got rid of in the hopes of glossing over an unpleasant bit of history." Perhaps the next iteration, in another 15 or 20 years, will be "pigment-endowed," or perhaps "Nubian American."

But of all the PC terms in circulation today, renaming diseases because of negative associations with those diseases is beyond asinine, it is beneath the most feeble intellect housed within a human skull. Shall we rename Anthrax "Letter-box Syndrome", Small Pox "Dubya's Disease", and Lou Gehrig's Disease "Stephen Hawking's Affliction?" once enough of us have seen Lou Gehrig's in action to form a negative opinion about it?

Feh. Leprosy is leprosy, political correctness be damned.

intracellular pathogens

[Bowling Moses]

Before anybody asks how they're linked, one way is that they all at some point reside inside the cells of their unfortunate host:
Mycobacterium leprae is the causative agent of leprosy aka Hansen's Disease and invades neurons.
Mycobacterium tuberculosis causes tuberculosis, and during the course of infection can reside inside of macrophages.
Plasmodium falciparum causes malaria, and invades red blood cells.
Legionella pneumophila causes Legionnaire's Disease aka Legionellosis, and at one point in infection resides inside lung cells.
Interestingly, except for P. falciparum these pathogens are bacteria. P. falciparum is a single cellular eukaryote.

Re:intracellular pathogens

[Simon Field]

It would also be interesting to know if the gene that allows the infection is somehow useful for something beneficial, causing it to be conserved.

Or is leprosy a young disease, and there hasn't been time for the gene to be selected against?

Re:intracellular pathogens

[Bowling Moses]

Well, M. tuberculosis and M. avium are two closely related pathogens (M. avium causes TB in birds, IIRC) that look like they utilize the same metabolic pathway in the course of disease. M. leprae is closely related to these two pathogens and has a similar "lifestyle" so it might also use the same pathway. Interestingly the pathway (the glyoxylate shunt enzymes isocitrate lyase and malate synthase) might also used by Candida albicans, an opportunistic pathogen responsible for most fungal infections in immunocompromised patients. Hell, there's even a plant pathogen where this pathway has been implicated as being important for virulence. Anyway, if indeed this pathway is required in TB or leprosy or whatever, then that's great since humans don't have either enzyme--which might make drug design a little easier if you can make the drug target these enzymes.

Gads, my reading list keeps on getting more bizarre--I'm a chemistry student, damnit!

Re:intracellular pathogens

[20_ooodbye]

Leprosy is a very old disease. It has undergone a very reductive evolution to the point that is utterly depentant on its human host to survive.

The genes that cause susceptibility in humans may be "plugging a gap" in the pathogen's range of biochemical reactions.

It seems possible the susceptibility genes do bestow some advantage to their owner until they are exposed to the bug, but if as it seems most people can live happily without the genes then a treatment might be abled to be made based on this .

Re:And of course...

[AyeFly]

Q: Why did the leper fail his driving test?

!ekarb eht no toof sih tfel eH :A (reverse)

Hansen's Disease is not Biblical Leprosy

[PepperedApple]

I learned in a class that the leprosy in the Bible is not the same as Hansen's Disease, or the modern day leprosy. this [webspawner.com] explains some of the differences.

susceptibility genes

[gene_tailor]

Identifying genes which make certain people more susceptible to certain bugs is an exciting growth area in science which has been greatly aided by the sequencing of the human genome. With regard to leprosy in particular, only a minority of the people exposed to the pathogen will go on to develop the disease. Several groups have been looking for genes which make these individuals more susceptible, and about a dozen candidates areas of the genome are known from previous research. Adrian Hill's group at Oxford, for example, has mapped two other different leprosy-susc. loci (on Chromosomes 10 and 20). Hopefully, once such genes are studied in more detail it will be possible to develop better treatments or even preventative measures.