The Self-Cannibals

I have finished my book! I saved the best essay for last, The Self-Cannibals. It was so interesting and yet it was really hard to read about. It's about the Lesch-Nyhan syndrome. The syndrome is caused by just one little change in a person's DNA. If a person has this syndrome their life is pretty much self-sabotage. They say no when they mean yes. They are nice to people they don't like and mean to the people that they do like. They only eat the food they hate. And the worst part of it all, they eat themselves. They are highly alert people and they know exactly what is going on, they feel pain just like the rest of us. They are terrified of seeing their hands because they know they will just try to eat them. Since people with this syndrome know what's going on, they constantly ask to be tied up or restrained when they are feeling nervous. If they aren't restrained in time, they will start to bite at their hands or anything else and be begging for help as they do it. They have no control.
This was very hard to read because I kept putting myself in their situation. What if I was a parent and my child had this? What would I do? How do parents actually deal with this and know what the right thing to do is? Or worse, what if I had this syndrome? The essay says that people with Lesch-Nyhan syndrome are very pleasant and interesting people.
Another thing that interested me was how easily they can die. Most people with the syndrome live to their mid 30's or 40's. A man with the disease can fling his head back with such force that his neck will break and he will die instantly.
I truly enjoyed this book! I love the way Richard Preston writes and I'm actually learning something as I read!

The Human Kabbalah

This chapter is about the Human Genome Project. It was an ongoing nonprofit international research consortium that had been working to decipher the complete sequence of nucleotides, or letters, in human DNA. I never realized how much of a competition it was to be the first to read it! One thing that I found really interesting was the idea presented in the book of a smart card. If they were able to read the DNA they would store all the information on the Smart Card and you would have to carry around in your billfold or purse "just in case". Your doctor would read the smart card, and it would show your total biological-software code. Your doctor would be able to see the bugs in your code. The bugs are genes that make you vulnerable ti certain diseases. If you became sick, doctors could watch activity of your genes, using a so-called gene chips. Then doctors could watch how your body is responding to treatments! All our genes would be observed, operating in immense symphony. Just think of how this could totally change medicine?! It really blew my mind when I read that.

The Search for Ebola

This chapter covers the "search for Ebola". They discovered it by a man called G.M. got it at Kitwit, which is in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. He got infected (they think in the forest because he was a charcoalmaker) and over they next few days he began to feel unwell. He ran a high fever and his eyes turned bright red. When his family first took him to the hospital they people called it la diarrhee rouge, the red diarrhea.

After G.M. died of this, all three members of his family died. The virus spreads throughout the city and soon it got into the Kikwit Maternity Hospital. Ebola would infect both the mother and baby, each of them dying. What literally made me gasp aloud was when I read that the nurses and doctors at the hospital didn't wear gloves because they ran out!!!!! Of course these nurses and doctors died of Ebola as well. I just couldn't believe it though, isn't that they number one rule? Never touch someone else's blood without gloves on! I guess they didn't know that then.... I was also very impressed with all the doctors and nurses that volunteered to stay and help with all the patients. There was little or no pay, that is pretty courageous. When I was reading I asked myself if i would have stayed... and I don't think I would have!

A Death in the Forest

This chapter is about how insects are becoming infected and in return they are destroying hemlocks (trees). One of the places it happened to was Great Smoky Mountains National Park. When they noticed the trees starting to die, they tried to get the government to help but they didn't! So it was out of the park's own pocket to try and save the hemlocks. They were pretty much living on "life support" because they trees were infected and they knew no way to save them. So they continued to give the trees drugs to keep them  a live in hopes that they'll stay a live long enough that they'll be able to find a cure. Why not just let the trees die? Even when the drugs didn't work and the trees died, it was another two to three thousand dollars for the park to have the trees removed!