There are certainly bacteria and viruses that have mutated, which may have caused diseases to become worse. Miranda wrote a great answer on superbugs which you can check out here: https://bit.ly/15cQIjR
Swine flu and bird flu are other examples of diseases caused by viruses that have mutated, in these cases, they viruses mutated and were able to infect humans.
Most cancers arise from mutated cells. Quite often, I know it’s common in multiple myeloma, the cancerous cells will cause the disease to return and often the cancer is more aggressive (the cells grow much faster) and more drug resistant (the common drugs won’t work as well, if at all, sometimes higher doses may be needed, or new drugs might need to be tried).
One of the biggest obstacles to eradicating (completely getting rid of) certain diseases is the ability of the bacteria/virus/cell to mutate and overcome whatever treatment we give them.
Cindy is spot on. bacteria and Virii are experts at mutating.
HIV is well known for mutating, which is why it has been so hard to find a cure for it, much like superbugs, the virus changes when it encounters a new drug, changing bit by bit until it is resistant.
The common cold caused by the rhinovirus also does this, and now there are over 180 different strains of the virus, which is again, why we dont have a cure, because targetting all 180+ at once is almost impossible (but i bet scientists somewhere are trying!)
To add a little to Cindy’s answer, as she said cancers arise from mutated cells. But once a cancer starts growing it can keep on mutating and different parts of the cancer and mutate differently. Sometimes if you take a biopsy from different sides of a tumor and sequence them, they will show different mutations. This is just another part of why cancers can be complicated to treat.
There are also some diseases which don’t involve mutations to DNA but can change like allergy. There is no genetic changes, but sometimes when people have childhood allergies they can disappear when they are adults or they can get worse. So the allergy can ‘change’ but it doesn’t mutate your genetics
Interesting question misszomibe.
There are certainly bacteria and viruses that have mutated, which may have caused diseases to become worse. Miranda wrote a great answer on superbugs which you can check out here: https://bit.ly/15cQIjR
Swine flu and bird flu are other examples of diseases caused by viruses that have mutated, in these cases, they viruses mutated and were able to infect humans.
Most cancers arise from mutated cells. Quite often, I know it’s common in multiple myeloma, the cancerous cells will cause the disease to return and often the cancer is more aggressive (the cells grow much faster) and more drug resistant (the common drugs won’t work as well, if at all, sometimes higher doses may be needed, or new drugs might need to be tried).
One of the biggest obstacles to eradicating (completely getting rid of) certain diseases is the ability of the bacteria/virus/cell to mutate and overcome whatever treatment we give them.
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Cindy is spot on. bacteria and Virii are experts at mutating.
HIV is well known for mutating, which is why it has been so hard to find a cure for it, much like superbugs, the virus changes when it encounters a new drug, changing bit by bit until it is resistant.
The common cold caused by the rhinovirus also does this, and now there are over 180 different strains of the virus, which is again, why we dont have a cure, because targetting all 180+ at once is almost impossible (but i bet scientists somewhere are trying!)
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To add a little to Cindy’s answer, as she said cancers arise from mutated cells. But once a cancer starts growing it can keep on mutating and different parts of the cancer and mutate differently. Sometimes if you take a biopsy from different sides of a tumor and sequence them, they will show different mutations. This is just another part of why cancers can be complicated to treat.
There are also some diseases which don’t involve mutations to DNA but can change like allergy. There is no genetic changes, but sometimes when people have childhood allergies they can disappear when they are adults or they can get worse. So the allergy can ‘change’ but it doesn’t mutate your genetics
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