Survival Of The Sickest Analysis

2.Iron extremely impactful in our life. One, it carries oxygen from our lungs through the blood stream and releases it in the body where it’s needed. Is also built into the enzymes that help us detoxify poisons and convert sugars and energy. Iron is also responsible for the healthy immune system function. Without enough iron in our system, skin gets pale, people can feel confused, dizzy, cold, and extremely fatigued. It explains why some areas of the world’s oceans are

In chapter one it talks about how hemachromatosis is a hereditary disease and it’s the most common genetic disease for people of European descent, in which the body can't register that it has enough iron. So it keeps absorbing as much of it as possible, and this can have very, serious side effects (including death). Iron is very important for bacteria, cancer, and other things to grow. The way this disease is most easily treated is blood letting. Looks like all those crazy blood-letting, leech-sticking doctors weren't mistreating everyone. What is the author's argument for why this disease stuck around? To really simplify things: during the black plague in Europe, people with more iron in their system were more likely

Diabetes is a common disease, which can be a serious life-long illness caused by high level of glucose in the blood. This condition is when the body cannot produce insulin or lack of insulin production from the beta cells

Diabetes, Diabetes Mellitus, is a chronic illness this means that it has no cure and the symptoms persist over a long period of time. This illness is a result of an imbalance of hormones, insulin, produced in the pancreas. Insulin plays an important role in how the body uses food. Insulin enables the cells in the bloodstream to absorb and use glucose for fuel. If the pancreas produces too little or no insulin or if the insulin doesn’t work properly the person may become diabetic. Therefore, diabetics are not able to properly convert food into fuels needed by the body to function, which can seriously lead to physical consequences.

Hemochromatosis is a genetic disease in which there is too much iron that builds up in your body, this is referred to as an iron overload. Iron is an essential nutrient found in many foods but can be toxic to our bodies if we have to much. “Normally, humans absorb about 8-10% of the iron found in foods that they eat.” People with Hemochromatosis can absorb up to four times more iron than a normal human being. Since our bodies have no natural way to get rid of the extra iron, it gets stored in your body tissue including the liver, heart, pancreas and many other areas of our body can also be infected by this iron overload.

The first disease Moalem discusses, hemochromatosis, is a hereditary disorder that he himself lives with. It causes excess iron buildup throughout the body, damaging “the joints, the major organs, and overall body chemistry” (p. 13). Hemochromatosis can lead to “liver failure, heart failure, diabetes, arthritis, infertility, psychiatric disorders[, ...] cancer” (p. 13) and, in the end, death. Although it is more common in some communities than others, today the low-penetrance disease only manifests in 1 in 200 people.

Diabetes is a metabolic disease in which the body’s inability to produce any or enough insulin. This causes elevated levels of glucose in the blood. This can be a very life threatening disease if left un treated. One of the symptoms are hunger and fatigue. If your body can’t get enough insulin the glucose

Diabetes mellitus is a condition where the hormone insulin is not being naturally made by the pancreas, is being made in small amounts or is not being used properly by the body. If left untreated, the most sever type of diabetes would lead to certain death because of the lack of glucose in the cells and vital organs.

In the book, “Survival of the Sickest”, Sharon Moalem forms the basis of how vaccine originated to become a way of combatting the most dangerous diseases in the world. It began with a discovery from a man named Edward Jenner, a doctor from Gloucestershire county in England, where he began to understand a strange pattern when people who were immune to cowpox were struggling with smallpox and vice-versa. He started to test his findings through a small experiment where he injected cow pox into a group of young children and he was surprised to see that their bodies built immunity towards smallpox and supported his findings on the bizarre immunity of people towards either the smallpox or the cowpox but not to both. The rest of the chapter explains complex concepts

Hemochromatosis, also called iron overload, is a disease when the body absorbs too much iron from the food we eat and most often affects the liver, heart, pancreas, and skin. It is usually caused by genes in the body that mutate keeping them from working. Some signs and symptoms of this disease are weakness, joint pain, low libido, and/or if the disease has progressed to far diabetes or heart failure. Hemochromatosis is one of the more difficult diseases to diagnose because many symptoms are nonspecific and usually many people don’t show as many symptoms except elevated iron levels in their blood. Most will be treated with blood transfusions until the normal level of iron is reached. If diagnosed early the prognosis is excellent with possible checkups or phlebotomies.

Take hemochromatosis, a hereditary condition that causes iron to accumulate in a person's body. A person having hemochromatosis

He explains that it benefits the immune system by keeping macrophages (protective blood cells) low on iron even though there is an excess in the liver and other areas. That way, when macrophages carry diseases to the lymphatic system to be killed, they can’t multiply and use the lymphatic system to seize the rest of the body. This is what enabled the survivors of the bubonic plague, tuberculosis, and many other disease to continue living. This may be why hemochromatosis is one of the most prevalent diseases in people of European descent. Once again, a recurring topic is bloodletting. Moalem gives us the background of the practice and explains why something so rudimentary would still be used today: there is a ton of iron in

Hemochromatosis is a deadly disease in which the body believes that it never has enough iron. The body, as a result is that iron is not filtered out through the intestines, it is always entering the body. This iron runs out of places to be stored, and is spread throughout the body. These iron stores eventually end up changing the body and causing damage to major organs and joints. Hemochromatosis can lead to cancer, heart failure, and a plethora of other problems.

Survival of the Sickest is a fascinating book that explores why we need disease and how different diseases have evolved from the beginning of time. Author, Dr. Sharon Moalem goes beyond the surface and answers many questions about evolution and disease for example, “Was diabetes evolution’s response to the last Ice Age?” and many others. Dr. Moalem shares how many of the diseases that we call harmful today have actually proven to be beneficial to survival for our ancestors. This book shows how every single thing that our ancestors have done in the past from the environment they lived in to the food they ate can be seen in our genetic code. Survival of the Sickest does not solely focus on the history of disease and evolution, it shows the reader

Diabetes mellitus (sometimes called "sugar diabetes") is a condition that occurs when the body can 't use glucose (a type of sugar) normally. Glucose is the main source of energy for the body 's cells. The levels of glucose in the blood are controlled by a hormone called insulin, which is made by the pancreas. Insulin helps glucose enter the cells.