AMONG GENETIC DISEASES, PERIODIC DISEASE CHARACTERISTIC OF ARMENIANS
Noyan Tapan
Feb 19 2007
YEREVAN, FEBRUARY 19, NOYAN TAPAN. The number of types of genetic
diseases grows year by year in the world. Currently there are 15
thousand types of hereditary diseases. Tamara Sargsian, Director of
Yerevan Center for Medical Genetics and Primary Health Protection,
informed Noyan Tapan correspondent about it. In her words, chromosome
diseases are especially widely-spread: one out of 600 children in the
world is born with some chromosome anomaly, one out of 2000 new-born
boys is born with mental backwardness conditioned by X chromosome and
one out of 2500 new-born babies has mukoviscidoz. It was mentioned
that there are also some rare genetic diseases (Cornelia de Lange,
Wolf Hirschhorn Syndrome) diagnosed to one out of 100 thousand
new-born babies. The Center Director said that even if one gene
change can cause incurable diseases (cancer, diabetes). T. Sargsian
said that periodic disease (Yerevan disease) is characteristic of
Armenians. In her words, in total, over 7000 patients suffering from
periodic disease have been examined at the Center. According to T.
Sargsian’s observations, though genotherapy is not a fantastic notion
today, nevertheless, it is not used in any country for the present. In
her words, some steps are taken in this direction: many experiments
and clinic studies have been conducted. "Genotherapy is medicine’s
future: if we want to cure a disease, we should start it from depth,"
T. Sargsian said. Unfortunately, in the Center Director’s words,
no specialists of genetics are trained in Armenia.
For the purpose of filling up this gap, the Center conducts courses
dedicated to medical genetics. Besides, Center’s specialists teach
this subject at Yerevan Medical University.