Sunday, December 26, 2010

Evolution did not stop at the neck: PKU

Phenylketonuria is a rare inherited genetic disease (incidence ~ 1/15000) that left untreated leads to retardation and seizures.  It can be treated and and most first world newborns are tested.  With a special diet most suffers are spared a ride on the short bus although a meta analysis (Moyle 2007) showed PKU patients to have average IQs approximately 0.5 of an SD lower than those of controls.  So is the incidence of PKU distributed evenly throughout human sub-populations/races?  Probably not, Hardelid (2007) found the incidence among Europeans about 10 times that of individuals of African descent.

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