We celebrate Charles Darwin for his incredible contributions to science and also the practical ways in which his evolution theory improves life today. Evolution theory has been used in various ways. Below are some of the reasons why evolution is important.
Emerging Diseases
The outbreak of diseases such as the swine flu reminds us of how vulnerable we are to emerging diseases. The abrupt appearance of diseases like swine flu emphasizes the fact that viruses evolve hence producing new and potentially pandemic-causing contagions. In today’s highly mobile world, new viruses can jump continents in a matter of hours via planes. Rapid evolution combined with rapid travel implies that emerging diseases threaten human health. Understanding how the diseases evolve is therefore vital like never before.
HIV
One of the reasons why no vaccine against HIV has been found is that it is one of the fastest evolving entities known to science. Its rapid adaptability implies that the key to defeating it may lie in better understanding of how the viruses evolve. Evolution helps in understanding the origin of HIV.
The technique of applying drug cocktails to people infected with HIV has proven remarkably successful. The evolutionary idea with these drugs is that since HIV evolves so quickly, a single drug will leave some surviving viruses. A multi-drug approach, therefore, has better results. Besides, periodically switching the cocktail’s components helps in eliminating viruses that have evolved resistance. All these techniques are based on scientific understanding of evolution.
Vaccines
Apart from clean drinking water, few technologies have improved human health more than vaccines. Whereas misinformed celebrities may peddle long-discredited superstitions about the link between autism and childhood vaccines, the truth is that most adults are healthy an alive today because of the childhood vaccines they received.
Vaccines exploit the efficiency of our immune system to recognize and eliminate microbial threats which have previously been introduced into the body. Since these threats evolve, vaccines also have to change. Evolution makes sense of the need for new vaccines every year and points the way towards developing it.
Antibiotic Resistance
Penicillin used to be a miracle drug, but today medical professionals find a lot of diseases evolving resistance to antibiotics. The origin of antibiotic-resistant organisms is an example of natural selection. Patients infected with a diverse population of bacteria are given antibiotics to wipe out the bacteria. If you do not finish the dosage, what is left are the most resistant bacteria to the drug. Understanding the evolutionary process is a vital part of modern public health.
Drug Development
New drugs have to be tested for various safety factors, yet we cannot give unknown drugs to human test subject and hope for the best. Since we know from evolution that we share a common ancestor with animals like dogs, macaques, and mice, we can test drugs on such animals without endangering humans. Evolution has helped scientist identify sources of lifesaving drugs.
There are many reasons why evolution is essential to medicine. It also has several other application like forensics, bioengineering, and agriculture. At teesside university mymail you can learn more on the science of evolution.