Huntington’s disease is a very serious disease that cannot be cured, but very few people are educated about this disease or have even heard of it. Huntington’s disease is becoming more common amongst American’s and globally each year and yet there is still not a cure for this disease. “More than a quarter of a million Americans have HD or are "at risk" of inheriting the disease from an affected parent.” (Huntington’s) Huntington’s is a hereditary disease that is passed from a parent to a child and is a part of that person’s genes, so this disease cannot be passed from one person to the next like many other illnesses but in many ways is worse because of the life that people with this disease are forced to live. There isn’t anything simple about
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“Normally, this section of DNA is repeated 10 to 28 times. But in persons with Huntington disease, it is repeated 36 to 120 times.”(Board, A.) If either of a person’s parents has this defect then that child has a 50/50 chance of carrying the gene as well. There are two types of Huntington’s and the difference in the two is that one type affects younger children and young adults and the other, and more common type, is when the disease affects a mature adult that is anywhere from the age of thirty to fifty years old. The more this disease is passed down from generation to generation, the symptoms and onset of the disease begin to occur earlier in life and since the average life span after symptoms begin to occur can be as short as ten years it is very important to be aware of this disease and to be careful when having children. Since Huntington’s symptoms don’t become noticeable until a person is fully developed and older, those people can have children and pass on the gene without being fully aware of the situation. People who have Huntington’s are not affected in just one area of the body, but in every single part of the body instead. Twitching, tremors, and clumsiness are some of the physical effects of Huntington’s but Huntington’s can also affect the mind by affecting a person’s mood, ideas, and making it harder for that person to remember things. These symptoms are examples of the early signs that someone may have Huntington’s disease but the longer someone has the disease, the worse the symptoms
“Normally, this section of DNA is repeated 10 to 28 times. But in persons with Huntington disease, it is repeated 36 to 120 times.”(Board, A.) If either of a person’s parents has this defect then that child has a 50/50 chance of carrying the gene as well. There are two types of Huntington’s and the difference in the two is that one type affects younger children and young adults and the other, and more common type, is when the disease affects a mature adult that is anywhere from the age of thirty to fifty years old. The more this disease is passed down from generation to generation, the symptoms and onset of the disease begin to occur earlier in life and since the average life span after symptoms begin to occur can be as short as ten years it is very important to be aware of this disease and to be careful when having children. Since Huntington’s symptoms don’t become noticeable until a person is fully developed and older, those people can have children and pass on the gene without being fully aware of the situation. People who have Huntington’s are not affected in just one area of the body, but in every single part of the body instead. Twitching, tremors, and clumsiness are some of the physical effects of Huntington’s but Huntington’s can also affect the mind by affecting a person’s mood, ideas, and making it harder for that person to remember things. These symptoms are examples of the early signs that someone may have Huntington’s disease but the longer someone has the disease, the worse the symptoms