Table of contents:
- How do genetic diseases arise in the body?
- How can congenital diseases be passed on to posterity?
- Hereditary diseases can skip a generation
- Can I avoid congenital illnesses in the family?
You may have often seen real examples in the people around you, that the talent for disease can be passed from parent to child. Even in some cases, hereditary diseases can also skip a generation. So it is precisely his grandson who has the same disease as his grandfather or grandmother.
However, is it certain that a person will suffer from a disease suffered by his parents or grandparents? Why can certain diseases pass from grandparents directly to grandchildren, not to their own children? Here's the explanation.
How do genetic diseases arise in the body?
Before explaining how your children and grandchildren may get inherited from your own disease, first understand how genetic diseases can form in the human body.
Unlike influenza or dengue hemorrhagic fever (DHF), genetic diseases are not solely caused by external bacterial or viral infections. The cause is damage to the genes in your body.
Gene damage occurs when your body is exposed to free radicals and chemicals that change your genetic code. In addition, gene damage can also occur if you are under severe stress.
Because there are defective genes, the cells in your body cannot function normally. This is what causes disease to emerge. These range from fairly common genetic diseases such as asthma, heart disease, diabetes, cancer, and depression to rare genetic diseases such as Down syndrome and color blindness.
How can congenital diseases be passed on to posterity?
The genes in your body are formed from a combination of the genes of the father and the genes of the mother. Later, the genes that are most dominant will determine your physical and psychological condition. Suppose your father has been fond of smoking since you were not born. The toxins and chemicals from cigarettes also cause damage to the father's genes. This damage eventually leads to lung cancer.
The damaged father gene will be carried away by sperm cells. If this gene is strong and dominant enough, this gene will survive in the fetus which is formed from the meeting of sperm and egg cells. So, when you are born, you have inherited the talent for lung cancer from your father's genes.
The risk of lung cancer is even greater if you live a lifestyle that can trigger this disease. For example, you were exposed to secondhand smoke from your father since childhood or you smoked yourself.
Hereditary diseases can skip a generation
Make no mistake, hereditary diseases are not only inherited by children, but also by your grandchildren or even your great grandchildren. As an illustration, your grandfather has asthma. However, it turns out that your mother did not inherit the disease from her grandfather. In fact, it is you as the granddaughter who eventually gets asthma. This means that the disease skips the second generation, namely your mother, and directly to the third generation, which is you.
How could this happen? Put simply, your mother's body is simply "host" to the genes that cause asthma. This gene only resides in the mother's body, does not attack in the form of a disease. Either because this gene is not dominant in the mother's body or because of other factors such as a healthy lifestyle.
However, the genes that cause asthma do not just disappear. Your father may have similar genes. As a result, you get the combination of genes that cause asthma from mom and dad. This gene changes to become dominant in your body so that you also develop congenital asthma.
In the end, genes simply cannot jump generations. Genes will continue to be passed down from generation to generation. It is the disease itself that may jump a generation.
Can I avoid congenital illnesses in the family?
Until now there has been no science that has been able to stop the development of hereditary diseases in a person's body. However, you still have the opportunity to delay or prevent the progression of hereditary diseases.
The trick is to avoid disease triggers (risk factors). For example, by living a healthy lifestyle and diet as early as possible.
If you already know that there is a history of certain diseases in your family, be aware of the symptoms and immediately check with your doctor if you have any complaints. The sooner you detect a hereditary disease, the better chance you have of treating or controlling the disease.
