Gout is caused by high amounts of uric acid in the blood. Your uric acid levels are the result of how much your body makes minus how much it excretes. Only 10 percent of people with gout produce too much uric acid; a full 90 percent don’t excrete enough. When that happens, the acid crystalizes in the blood, accumulates in the joints, and causes intense discomfort.
Just last year, researchers identified 183 different locations on genes that are strongly associated with high levels of uric acid in the blood. If your body is genetically inefficient at excreting uric acid, you’re more prone to developing gout than the average person.
How Gout Discriminates
For more proof that gout is largely genetic, just look at who gets it.
Some of the groups with the highest incidence of gout include the Hmong of Southeast Asia, the Māori of New Zealand, and Pacific Islanders., If gout were mainly a dietary problem, we would expect the diets of these peoples to be rich in organ meats, red meat, wild game, shellfish, soda, and alcohol — all the things people with gout are told to avoid.
But that’s not the case. These cultures’ dietary traditions emphasize fruits, vegetables, rice, and starchy tubers — not the classic problematic gout foods. When Polynesians move to New Zealand and stop eating their traditional diet, though, their rates of gout skyrocket. https://go-out.life/blogs/articles/role-that-genetics-plays-in-gout
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