Ancestry.com Wants Your Help in Mapping COVID-19

Your blood type could be your armor against coronavirus.  A few weeks ago, some medical analysis suggested people with Type O blood appear to have some built in immunity.  This included positive and negative.  There also could be numerous other genetic factors playing a role in severity of infection.

Ancestry.com is looking for some answers.  Some of you may already be members of the site. I took the genetic test several years ago.  My results essentially backed up what I already knew about my family. The very same genetic information that tells you where your people came from can also be used to map some diseases and perhaps some future cures and prevention.

What genetics have been teaching us for a long time is there are some populations that can better stand up to some illnesses.

For instance, I don’t get the flu very often.  I can’t remember the last time I had the classic flu symptoms.  About once and sometimes twice a year I get a cold.  A doctor told me a few years ago I’ve had the flu and just didn’t know I had been infected.  In other words, my symptoms would generally be so mild I would think it was a cold.

Since the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic, there have been people who’ve reported very mild symptoms after testing positive.  Many don’t even know they had it and others report a few hours of chills.  While others have fared far worse with long term illnesses, some permanent damage and death.

In other words, the way most viruses have played out during human history.

I took the ancestry survey.