HYDERABAD, May 25: British genetic scholar Dr M. J. Denton has said that Sindh contains an enormous number of pedigrees with all sorts of genetic diseases.

There are families in Sindh suffering from cancer, diabetes, schizophrenia and other diseases.

He said that the diseases affected larger number of families than in western countries and far more powerful for gene mapping than typical pedigrees in the West.

Speaking during a lecture programme on “Human genome potential of Sindh” at the Multimedia Centre of the Institute of Information Technology University of Sindh on Wednesday, Dr Denton said that research figures were quite disturbing.

Dr Denton, who is at present working as HEC’s foreign professor in the University of Sindh, said that genes were responsible for predisposing individuals to various common diseases of adulthood such as cancer, heart disease, diabetes, hypertension and schizophrenia.

He said that huge Sindhi pedigrees provided a unique and exceptionally valuable resource for gene mapping and could contribute greatly to our knowledge of human disease genes over the next few decades.

“They provide an opportunity for researchers in Sindh to play a role in the area of research with a major competitive advantage over their peers in western countries” he said.

“This should enable them to generate world class publishable results and greatly enhance their own scientific careers”, he said.

The scholar said that his own achievements in the field of retinal gene mapping borne out the fact that access to ideal genetic material was by far the major factor guaranteeing success.

He said that any gene mapping facility that had access to these wonderful pedigrees and set about analysing them in a systematic way was bound to generate new and useful insights into human genetics.

He said that gene mapping would also provide the genetic basis of human disease as well as further the research careers of Sindhi scientists and workers in the region.

The scholar said that there were compelling reasons for establishing a human gene mapping facility in the University of Sindh because the university was at the geographical centre of Sindh surrounded by rural hinterland in which these remarkable families were to be found.

He said that the population of Sindh was now 40 million and it would grow to 60 million in the next two decades.

At present, Sindh’s population was equivalent to that of many large European countries and surely it justified setting up of at least one human gene mapping facility in Sindh.

He said that genetic diseases were a major cause of disability, death, and human tragedy in the world.

He said that 30 per cent of the world population suffered from cancer and 30 per cent from heart diseases, both influenced strongly by genetic factors.

He said that it could be safely said that burden of genes afflicted us all.

He said that about seven per cent of all births had congenital abnormality, 40 per cent infant mortality was due to genetic disease, 30 per cent of pediatric and 10 per cent of adult patients require hospital admission because of specific genetic disorders.