Publications
Partners
With the rise in the prevalence of mental disorders the world over, Africa is going to need an African solution for these conditions, and the key could just be in its population’s genetics.
Why is Africa different? It’s rooted in our unique genetic, cultural and environmental profiles.
But, to a large extent, according to researchers and scholars, Africans have been left out of wider mental health studies, either as researchers or participants, despite being part of a significantly diverse population.
Local researchers have now argued in a recent article, titled Mental health genetics: African solutions for African challenges, published in The Conversation recently, that this has raised an “all too familiar concern that Africa could be a bystander as advances in molecular and genetic research of the brain proceed at a breakneck speed”.
The article is co-authored by Benyam Worku Dubale, assistant professor and head of the Department of Psychiatry at Addis Ababa University; Celia van der Merwe, post-doctoral research fellow at the University of Cape Town; and Dr Nathaniel McGregor, lecturer and researcher in the Department of Genetics at Stellenbosch University.
Speaking to City Press about their assertion, McGregor and Van der Merwe explained: “It’s important to remember that 99% of our genome, or genetic code, is identical to all other humans, regardless of race.
“However, it’s the 1% that differs between people that makes us unique. Those differences, in various combinations, can contribute to the development of the same disorder, and might help to explain why different people present with varying severity.”
Last month, The Lancet Commission on global mental health revealed that mental disorders would cost the global economy $16 trillion (about R229 trillion) by 2030.
According to the World Health Organisation (WHO), half of all mental illnesses start at the age of 14, and most cases go undetected and untreated.
The WHO further states that, globally, depression is one of the leading causes of illness and disability among adolescents, with suicide the leading cause of death for 15 to 19 year olds.
Understanding the genetic factors which contribute to disease will be critical, particularly for Africa.
“It was once thought that African populations were at lower risk for many mental illnesses, primarily based on a small number of studies or national statistics looking at the prevalence of mental health disorders.
“However, lack of access to mental health professionals plays a significant role in those numbers. More recent evidence has not backed up that claim and studies are still going on,” they continued.
According to the authors, understanding genetic factors that contribute to disease not only provided important insights into the biology – which in turn could lead to the development of new medicines and treatments of disease – but also might explain why certain people respond to medicinal drugs and others do not.
“Pharmacological interventions have been designed based on work done mostly on individuals of European ancestry. We do not know yet if these new treatments are as effective in populations of African ancestry.
“We therefore need to actively advocate the inclusion of more genetically diverse populations,” the duo added.
They went on to say there had been a number of drugs that had been developed as a result of genetic research.
One example is a drug called Kalydeco, produced by Vertex Pharmaceuticals to treat cystic fibrosis.
“The genetic mutation linked to cystic fibrosis was first discovered in 1988. As technology improved, so did our understanding of the gene function and, in 2015, the first drug that directly targeted that gene mutation was approved by the Food and Drug Administration in the US. For the small population of people with the condition, this drug has been a game-changer, not just increasing life expectancy but, just as importantly, vastly improving quality of life,” McGregor and Van der Merwe explained.
But including diverse populations in research is crucial. The authors argued in the article: “A turning point in this disparity has been the realisation that the involvement of Africa in mental health research is vitally important. This is true for two reasons. Firstly, science that doesn’t include diverse population groups risks being biased, inaccurate and incomplete. Secondly, African populations are genetically the most diverse due to the continent’s unique position as a land of origins. Missing this diversity has held back the progress of mental health genetics research.”
